I'm Home!

My travels have come to an end. I’ve managed to delay my trip to Afghanistan till either April or May (thank goodness!). I arrived home on Saturday afternoon, Paul had returned home from his trip to Namibia and Lesotho on Friday. It’s really nice to be home!

Here is a picture of him doing some monitoring work up country in Namibia.

Looking back over the past 6 weeks, I’ve seen and learned a lot. Watching the news now about the worsening violence in The West Bank and Gaza, I can understand the situation so much better. I definitely feel the plight of the Palestinians, but with the recent shooting at the Jewish school in Jerusalem and the complementing celebrations by the Palestinians in Gaza I feel it’s all a bit hopeless.

Jordan remains stable, but how much longer can it support the large numbers of refugees fleeing the increasing violence in Iraq? Our programs there are providing much needed health and psychosocial interventions, but they are really just a drop in the bucket compared to the needs of the refugee and host populations alike.

Nepal is beautiful as ever. The elections are scheduled for April 11, 2008. People are beginning to believe they might actually happen this time, but many people, particularly those in the rural areas are scared to vote for fear of violence and reprisals instigated by the Maoist groups. We have decided that our program we are proposing here will target the conflict affected community, those that really need it. Hopefully the donor will agree with our assessment.

Now that I’m home, I probably won’t be updating this too often. DC is just not as exciting as the rest of the world. I’ll be back on the road soon though, I’m sure. So keep checking back!

West Bank, Palestine

What a fascinating and educational two days in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. I entered the West Bank via the East Jerusalem checkpoint. To do this I had to travel through the check point in the infamous Separation Wall. Israel says the barrier is necessary for security, while Palestinians call it a land grab.

Many Palestinians, including those that I work with, are restricted from traveling to Jerusalem, they need to have special permits. Actually they need to have special permits to travel most anywhere in the West Bank. My colleague has a permit that allows him to travel from Ramallah to Nablus, about 30 miles, but it is only good for 2 months from 5am to 7pm. His entire family lives in Nablus, his hometown, and he isn’t allowed to spend the night.

Each city in the West Bank has all entry and exit controlled through Israeli check points. These checkpoints are manned by Israeli military. Only special vehicles, with special permits, are allowed to pass through. The general population is let out on one side of the checkpoint and have to walk up to a quarter of a mile to the other side showing their ID and getting hassled by Israeli military along the way. It could take hours for a person to cross a checkpoint.

As we drove from Ramallah to Nablus I got a very good view of the surrounding countryside and a very good understanding of the extent of the illegal Israeli settlements in the Palestinian Territory. Each settlement, outpost, or expansion area has its own wall built a good distance away from the settlement – usually the settlement is at the top of the hill and the wall is around the base of the hill. Then there are also the walls surrounding the main Palestinian localities that allow the Israelis to control the majority of the movement of the Palestinian population within the West Bank. Many of the main roads have also been blocked by walls and barriers to prevent travel on these roads for non Israelis.

During my time here I met with the Director of International Cooperation at the Palestinian Ministry of Health, the Directors of the Palestinian Medical Relief Services, and the Palestinian Foundation for Health and Social Development. One of the big problems that is encountered here in Palestine in regards to health is the access to health care being blocked due in large part to this restriction of travel by the Israeli Occupying Forces. Just 5 days ago a Palestinian woman died at a check point when the IOF prevented her ambulance from reaching the hospital on the other side of one of the walls. That full story can be found here.

More pictures of Ramallah, Nablus and the wall are posted on my photo site.

The Holy Land

Traveling from Amman to Jerusalem is only about 50 miles, but it can take all day. Luckily for me it only took a few hours. After I made it across the “bridge” from Jordan into the West Bank I headed up to passport patrol and saw a young 20 something Israeli military woman, I thought “Oh good! She’ll like me”. One and a half hours later I was still answering questions on what work I do around the world, why I have an Afghan visa in my passport, where I live, why I’m visiting Israel/Palestine, etc. etc. Finally I passed my security check and was released and headed to Jerusalem!

So for some of you that know me you know that I went to Catholic school for 10 years, although I’m not Catholic (that’s a whole other story!). Unfortunately for those 10 years I did not pay much attention in my religion classes (or history for that matter – particularly when it involved religious history) and I have been wandering around the Old City of Jerusalem for the past 2 days, wishing I had paid more attention!

Here is some basic information on the Old City’s most holy sites (from an online site):

“Jewish Pilgrims come from all over the world to visit the Western Wall of the great Jewish temples which was also the place where it is believed that Abraham was told to sacrifice his son Isaac, but instead he spared his son's life and slaughtered a ram. The Western Wall is Judaism's holiest site.”

“Christian Pilgrims come from all over the world to carry a cross along the same path that Jesus carried the cross two thousand years ago. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre is built around what is believed to be the site of Christ's crucifixion, burial and resurrection.”

“Muslims make the pilgrimage from all over the world to Jerusalem to visit the Dome of the Rock which marks the spot where they believe that the prophet, Muhammad made an ascent to the heavens and saw God and then returned to Mecca the next morning.”

I’m not going to write any more about Jerusalem history or the sights, as I would just prove the point of how much I don’t know, but if you are interested in seeing pictures of my wanderings they are posted here.

Instead, here are a couple of my random observations:

A number of Israeli youth (non-military, or at least off duty military) choose to walk through the city nonchalantly carrying machine guns as an extra accessory to their Abercrombie hoodie and jeans.

I’ve been asked if I’m Israeli, Palestinian, and Jordanian. With my mouth closed I can pass for a number of cultures but as soon as I speak there is no question where I’m from – Canada.