From the Ridiculous to the Sublime

This has been the most memorable day of the trip so far. As I write this I am sitting in a cave on a Palestinian farm on a hilltop about five miles from Bethlehem where we are staying the night with a Palestinian family at what is called "The Tent of Nations." We started out visiting the ancient city of Hebron, which in recent years has been the locus of significant violence between radical right wing Israeli settlers and Palestinians. This is the first time that we felt like we were in danger. It took us a long time to get through the checkpoint at the entrance to the city, and when we finally got through the checkpoint we were taken aback to see men walking around with uzzis slung over their shoulders - and they were not the police or the army! We then had a meeting with a spokesperson for the settlers - a man named David Wilder, whom we rapidly concluded is truly a dangerous person. He has a complete bunker mentality, believes all Muslims are terrorists, believes that the Israelis must resort to violence at all times in order to stay safe and on and on. Truly, it became clear as our meeting went on that this was not a person one could talk to. He is simply too far gone in his fantasy world to be reasoned with. He reminded me of the crazy religious folks like the compound in Waco, Texas some years back. It was really scary listening to him. What was even more scary was walking through the Jewish part of the city back to find our guide, who, because he is Palestinian couldn't go with us to the meeting. There were men with guns all over the place and the soldiers were eyeing us pretty carefully. We then went to the mosque where Abraham and Sarah's tomb and Isaac and Rebekah's tomb are, having to go through incredible security to enter. Then we had a tour of the Palestinian parts of Hebron with a guide from the Christian Peacemakers Team. More on them in a later post. We only have the generator on here on the farm for another half hour so I've got to be quick tonight! While walking around Hebron with our guide, we were taken to a spot where the Israelis are trying to push into Palestinian farm land. The settlers were watching us carefully and we heard a gunshot nearby. It was a fascinating tour and I'll post pictures when I get back to Jerusalem.

We ended our day here at Daher's Vineyard, where we will spend the night. This is a Palestinian farm which has been in the same family since 1916. The Israelis have tried over and over to take the land from the family and they have fought back with lawsuits. They have also opened their farm to the world, erecting what they call the"Tent of Nations" here where groups like ours come and help the work the farm and learn about the Palestinian people and their culture and bear witness to their presence on the land. This was such a refreshing change from the crazy man we met in Hebron. Tonight we will have a campfire. The cave I'm sitting in now was the home of our host's father. His grandfather's cave is on the other side of this property. They have "upgraded" the cave to include lights and the internet!! Again, pictures to follow later. Much more could be said about today - it has been unbelievable, but time is short. The good news is there are people like Daoud, our host, who are working for peace and understanding in this war torn land and all our hopes are that his way of being in the world will prevail, not that of the nut we met this morning.

More tomorrow, maybe!