is no longer the bread of poverty of Jews but of numerous Palestinian families in the Occupied Territories
Wednesday, April 4, 2007 | The Jewish People are not my People | My People are Hashem and his Family from Bil`in. | Beni Tziper | Ha`aretz, 2 April 2007 | Hebrew original: http://www.haaretz.co.il/hasite/spages/845020.html | Translated by Rann Bar-On

There is nothing festive in this posting. Passover, shmassover, I hate the holidays because while we celebrate, while us Jews babble slogans about freedom, and fantasize that we are a miserable enslaved nation, we are in fact busy enslaving the Palestinian people. It`s become banal and boring to repeat this a thousand times, but in my eyes, the hypocrisy cries out to the heavens. [The Passover prayer] `Oh bread of poverty` is no longer the bread of poverty of Jews but of numerous Palestinian families in the Occupied Territories, who live off thirty or forty shekels the head of the household manages to scrounge together doing temporary jobs once every few days.

I got to know one such family this past Friday. I joined my daughter, Talila, at a demonstration against the Wall in Bil`in. The protocol involves gathering at Tel-Aviv`s Northern railway station and from there somehow organizing ourselves into Arab minibuses and private cars, and driving to those Palestinian villages whose income has been affected by the Wall. That is, the Wall separates between the villagers and their fields. My daughter is well-accustomed to these demonstrations. For me, this was the fist time. This is how I met Dr. Ilan Shalif, the living spirit of the the demonstrations and organizer of rides. ...
- posted by Editor @ 2:28 PM