Palestinian Diaspora & All That Comes With It

Asylum for My Refugee Mother

2012-02-28T00:03:00.001-06:00

My mother was fingerprinted the other day. No, she's not a criminal. It was a day she has been awaiting for over a decade, the beginning of her process of naturalization. Welcome to the life of an asylum seeker.

I remember the day the letter approving my father for receipt of his green card like it was yesterday. It was October 2008. He came home cheering, he called everyone downstairs, opened the letter, and announced that he was now permitted to re-enter the U.S. if he ever needed to leave. I was jumping up and down for so long and with such enthusiasm that my parents were afraid I'd hit the ceiling fan. To me, this announcement meant one thing: WE CAN GO TO PALESTINE! One problem, my mother still didn't have hers, so we had to wait.

My mother's letter came in in August 2009. I cried as soon as I knew. Finally, my family would be able to go to Palestine. I still had one living grandparent, a few single cousins, and a homeland to get acquainted with; we had so many reasons to go. My mother cried too, she had been dreaming of making Hajj, the Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca, for decades and now she had the means. We only had one week until the fall semester began, so traveling to Palestine was not an option, but you can believe I would make sure we went as soon as we could. I began plotting.

I applied for jobs with UNRWA in Gaza City and Islamic Relief. Needless to say, I was a senior in college, had no qualifications or experience, and no degree to my name, so I didn't get anything. After a few months, I pulled up a list of all of the Palestinian NGOs that signed the international call to BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions), applying to each NGO with a Gaza City office for internships or temporary positions. I heard back from one place, I told them I would come the summer of 2010, as soon as I graduated. I stayed in contact with them for over six months until I was able to convince my parents to take me to Gaza.

In the meantime, my mother did Hajj. It was the best experience of her life. She was every kind of sick you can imagine all at once for those two weeks and yet in pure bliss. There is nothing in the world she would have traded for that act of worship. She had originally planned to go visit her mother in the Gaza Strip after the pilgrimage. My grandmother was very ill and we didn't know how much longer she had, but the borders were shut tighter than ever before. Tunnels were not available for human transportation at that time. And, of course, the Erez crossing was not an option; Israel would never let a Palestinian cross, even one with a prized U.S. green card.

My mother returned from Hajj in December of 2009. My grandmother died in February of 2010. We were devastated. I could see regret in my mother's eyes. She felt as though she has not tried hard enough to see her mother one last time. We all knew that her efforts would have been in vain, but it was clear she felt as though she should have done more.

February 2010 was the moment that I lost my last blood connection to my hometowns in Palestine. I had no more living grandparents and my aunts and uncles who were born before 1948 were too young to really share any stories or descriptions of our places of origin. It felt as though Yaffa and Beir el Saba' were both forever lost. I promised myself that I would never entertain these depressing thoughts again. Whether my grandparents were dead or alive, my rights will always remain. Myparents, however, didn't feel as strongly as I did.

As I pleaded with my parents to book a trip to Gaza for us that summer, they kept making excuses: the borders are closed, we have no one there to visit, our siblings have their own lives and families to deal with, it's not safe, wait until we get citizenship... etc. I wasn't having any of it. And God was on my side. That summer, a miracle happened: Flotilla and the Mavi Marmara massacre. The world woke up to the importance of breaking the siege on Gaza and Egypt immediately "opened" the border to Gaza. It was a sign. I forced my parents to heed this sign. My efforts to convince them to book tickets to Cairo intensified: I began a nagging campaign asking my father daily if he purchased tickets, I gave them speeches about the importance of one's homeland, I wrote poems, and I had relatives join in my nagging. I was relentless, and it worked. My dad spoke to a travel agent. I was done with college and I had no immediate plans, we decided we'd go as soon as my brothers went back to school. (My parents had a strange fear that my brothers would trash the house if we left it to them for the summer.) Then I took an LSAT course, the LSAT, applied for law school, and we left. November 15th. I was on cloud nine, my life was absolutely perfect.

Fast forward a year and three months. My mother just got fingerprinted by the INS.

Now lets reflect on what this means to asylum-seeking families like mine.

Think back to November 2008. It was my first presidential election. I looked at my Palestinian, politics-obsessed father who has lived in the U.S. for 35 years and I told him, "Baba, I'm going to give you my vote." And I voted for my father's presidential candidate. I was proud that this loyal American, a man who almost never misses a presidential debate or interview with a single candidate would have a say in who runs this nation. I didn't mind giving him my vote, he deserved it more than I did. Plus, I could always convince my 17.98 year old brother to vote for whomever I pleased, so it wasn't a major sacrifice.

My mother, like most first generation Arab-Americans, has never shown any interest whatsoever in voting. She despises politics and politicians (she's a smart lady). When her letter came in, I asked her, "Mama, if they ask you 'Ma'am, would you fight in the U.S. military if asked?' what will you say?" She laughs. "I'll tell them what they want to hear, [48Refugee], I just want to be free." And free in this context does not mean the right to representation; it means freedom to leave the U.S. but still come back, freedom to go home and not stay. Is it bad that I was sad to hear this?

I have a friend who I met in 6th grade. She was a refugee from Bosnia and her family had been in the U.S. for five years at the time. Her family was granted asylum right away, but her father had refused to be naturalized. He refused to make an oath to swear his loyalty to the United States. This was not because he hated the U.S., but because he loved Bosnia. He was grateful to the U.S. for providing his family with a home when his own home nation was not safe for them, but his loyalty would always be to Bosnia. I always had great respect for him. Every other family I knew was an immigrant family, a family that came to the U.S. for money... and more money. These people always forgot their roots within a few years, but my friend's dad was a true patriot.

I wished that my mother was a true patriot, that she would never swear loyalty to any nation but her nation. I know deep down her loyalty is only to Palestine and that this oath will only be a formality, but I attach a lot of value to people's words.

Anyway, helping her study for the civics test and teaching her about the ideals that are the foundation of American values is making me strangely patriotic... It's confusing me. I guess there's no denying that the idea of the United States of America is nice and does make me feel warm and fuzzy all over, but the reality is not so nice. I think of Guantanamo Bay and the NYPD spying on Muslim-American students and the wars we have fought the past few decades and the millions of innocent people we have killed. Then I remember my dad singing along with the national anthem last night during the pre-show for the NBA All Star game. No one ever said you couldn't be critical of the U.S. and still be an American. I guess that's what I am.

Gaza Story: Tasting Gaza

2012-02-25T01:56:00.001-06:00

Clearly I am avoiding something (writing my spring brief) and I am really homesick. Here is a post full of delicious reminders of why you need to visit Gaza: her yummy food!

Homemade "saaj" bread--Bedouin style

"Routab" or dates

Pomelo

Guava

Crab soup

Fish, calamari, shrimp

Candy from our local dukkaneh via Egyptian tunnels

Tangerines and cute kids (please don't each our children)

Kharoub; it's delicious and I have no idea how to explain what it is. I know it comes from a seed that grows on a tree, that's about it though.

At-Taboun Pizza (not very good)

Best falafel in Gaza City

Cookies made in the Gaza Strip by a refugee family

I WILL HAVE YOU PHYSICALLY REMOVED IF YOU COME TO GAZA AND BUY ISRAELI HUMMUS.

Tea, all day and every day

Maftoul, or Palestinian couscous

Strange dish my mom's side makes; stuffed red carrots-- not very good, but if it'll bring you to Gaza.. by all means, welcome!

Coconut

When you host a large lunch and you have a restaurant prepare the food, the trays of rice come looking like this

Mud oven where the chicken for our maftoul was cooked

Maqlouba

Weird Israeli-engineered fruit: flora

Shrimp flavored chips-- not good, but if it'll get you here... welcome!

My aunt's famous pizza

Breakfast

Fresh fruit grown in our camp at the weekly market

Fresh spices ground in our camp at the weekly market

Fresh produce grown in our camp at the weekly market

Knafeh 'aarabiyeh-- delicious and only found in Gaza

Prickly pear

It may not look all that special, but this potato and red pepper pie is delicious!

Sugar cane juice-- again, not good, but some like it and I hear it's very healthy.

Mandi! The most delicious chicken dish ever developed by mankind!

Underground mandi oven

Party dishes

You can't come to Gaza and not have barrad, our very own lemon slushy drink.

Chocolate cake anyone?

Knafeh; 'arabiyeh in the foreground and Nabilsiyeh in the background

'awwameh, my best friend.

Don't worry, we will serve you tea to go with all these sweets!

I tasted this once and it was like mlukhiyyeh gone wrong; this is clled khubbeizeh

Birthday cake!

Yes, more 'awwameh because I love it so much.

I don't know if all of Gaza is this way, but everyone I met LOVED bananas. I'm really not sure why because they have so many more delicious fruits to choose from, but this is what they like.

Maftoul is a blessing from God.

Turmous! My parents will eat this anywhere.. here, they were at the Rafah Crossing-- right before my dad was nearly deported back to Gaza.

We'll even do the dishes for you, just come on by!

Gaza's Gorgeous Skies

2012-02-25T00:12:00.000-06:00

As you know, I'm obsessed with Gaza. This is not because Gaza is more beautiful than any other place in the world or because her people are more generous than the rest of the people in the world or because her history is richer than the history or any other place in the world. It has nothing to do with the actual nature of Gaza, my obsession is solely based on the fact that Gaza is mine and its the only part of my homeland I know so naturally, I'm going to cling to it as tightly as I can until I can develop a similar relationship with the rest of my homeland. Here is a post dedicated to one of the many parts of Gaza I love: her skies.

Nuseirat Camp beach, 2004

Deir el Balah Camp beach, 2010

Deir el Balah Camp, 2010

Deir el Balah Camp soccer, 2010

My cousins

Gaza City beach, 2010

Nitzarim Settlement, 2010

Khan Yunis beach, 2010

My cousins

I know, this isn't "pretty" but this was Gaza City during a sand storm in 2010. School was canceled and everything was unusually quiet and calm, and there's always beauty in that.

Maghazi Camp, 2010

Al Zahra district of Gaza City, 2010

Al Zahra, 2010

Wadi Gaza; where Gaza City's raw sewage is pumped into the Mediterranean, 2010

NOT beautiful, Israeli/American war plane's symbol of occupation in our sky

Naser district of Gaza City, 2011

Jabalia buffer zone, 2011

Al Rimaal district of Gaza City; partial solar eclipse, 2011

Maghazi Camp, 2011

Gaza City, 2011

Gaza Seaport, 2011

Katiba Square, Gaza City, 2010

Khan Yunis, 2011

Maghazi Camp, 2011

Omari Mosque, Gaza City, 2011

Sky light in Turkish bath in Gaza's Old City, 2011

Mama & Baba; Khan Yunis Camp beach, 2011

Nuseirat Camp, 2011

Al Noor Amusement Park; Gaza City, 2011

Agricultural District; Deir el Balah, 2011

Roof of Pasha's Palace; Gaza City, 2011

Rafah Crossing, 2012

Gaza Story: Palestinian Knights

2012-02-24T22:28:00.001-06:00

My 2004 trip to Palestine drastically changed me, my outlook on life, and my priorities. That summer was the birth of my activism. It was the second intifada, better known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada, and one of the bloodiest periods in Palestine's history.

The PA was still in charge, democracy had not yet been established in the Gaza Strip (even in the limited form present today), IDF invasions were common, and airstrikes took place nightly. If you lived in Rafah or Beit Hanoun, you were less living than merely surviving, your skies rained missiles, and your streets were littered with tanks.

I was living in the "Wusta" region of the Gaza Strip that summer, a term that refers to the central area of the strip where Deir el Balah and her surrounding refugee camps are situated. Our camp was on the eastern border of the Gaza Strip, and that meant we shared a border with Israel. My camp was known to have strong Fatah leanings, but the resistance was still strong and Hamas fighters monitored our streets by night. This was a time before Hamas was the recognized government of Gaza and the movement was seen simply for its two branches: the social and the military. In the minds of the children of my camp, this was interpreted as: summer camp and Palestinian Knights. Resistance fighters have always been the most respected and revered people in Palestinian society, and during this violence-ridden time, the love for the resistance nearly approached worship, especially by the children.

Many of the children from my camp ate lamb kabob sandwiches, and fresh meat for that matter, only when they went on Hamas summer camp field trips. For three weeks every summer, they memorized Quran, chanted nationalistic resistance songs, learned how to make pH balanced homemade soap, how to sign a few words in Palestinian sign language, how to use graphic design computer programs, melted wax into candles they could take home, and went on field trips to the Islamic University of Gaza, Gaza beach, Gaza amusement parks and zoos, the Gaza sea port. It was the highlight of most of their summers.

At night, they would stand on their rooftops and count off how many masked resistance fighters they could see. I was very bad at this game. I thought maybe night vision was a skill you developed only after having to live half of the nights of your life without electricity. Even ninety nights in the Gaza Strip didn't help me hone this skill. My cousins would point, "Look! Over there, by that light pole! And another, two meters away near that dumpster! Around the corner, two more!" I was blind to what my cousins saw.

The resistance fighters would walk up and down the main street of our camp in jeans and sandals and green vests with Russian automatic rifles strapped across their thin untrained bodies. They always looked so grown up with their masked faces, automatic weapons, and fearlessness, but I knew that a lot of them very likely were near me in age. I knew some of them were probably orphans, their fathers killed in the first intifada and that they likely craved to follow their fathers' path to martyrdom. I knew more of them probably wanted to live and that they were tired of posting the pictures of their murdered friends on the walls of the camp's alleys. I knew some of them preferred to guard the streets of their families to ensure their loved ones were safe, and I knew others walked up and down the street of the girl they loved hoping she slept unafraid that night. I knew some of them stayed up nights because they knew they wouldn't be able to sleep as the missiles and shells roared through Gaza's skies and exploded into Gaza's homes. I knew it was hard for me to sleep.

I always tried to pretend the bright lights racing across the sky were shooting stars, but no matter how hard I tried, I knew they were simply deliverers of death and destruction.

I was not surprised that these young men were looked up to by the children they protected, because I come from a place where we do the same thing. After September 11th, fire fighters and police officers became the domestic heroes of the United States. When Bush declared war on "terror," he set into effect a phenomenon commonly referred to as "rally around the flag" whereby Americans decided to act like one unified nation as we drove our nation into one of the worst deficits in its history in order to collectively murder over a million brown people in the Muslim world. Support for groups like Hamas and the American military is not difficult to understand and nations around the world have experienced the same reverence as well.

Hamas is now the legitimate government of Gaza, but they are not seen the same way as they once were. That tends to happen when politicians take office. I know I loved Obama until he showed me that his vacation in Hawaii was more important than saving the lives of Gaza's children in the winter of 2008-2009 when Israel decided to massacre 1400 people from the place I call home.

That summer was a strange summer. I tried to understand why the children from my camp could look at the young armed men walking our streets from 11PM to 4 AM as heroes, but it was hard for me. Now I see that it was less about the protection these men offered as it was about the illusion of safety they created. The children of the second intifada grew up hearing stories about the first intifada and they knew violence personally. Seeing these armed young men made them feel as though an invading army could not reach them, like Israeli tanks could not penetrate their camp. I too felt safer knowing the young men of my camp would watch the border and warn us of invasion. I did not worship them, like the other children of my camp; I could not even see them, but I understood the role they played in the lives of the sleeping children in my camp. They provided a sense of security, albeit false, that gave some stability to the lives of these sleeping children being forced to grow up in one of the most volatile parts of the world under the longest military occupation of the modern era. They of course didn't see it this way. They saw their Palestinian Knights as warriors, protectors of the night.

My camp in 2004:

With Hardship Comes Ease

2012-02-23T10:33:00.002-06:00

For truly, with hardship comes ease; truly, with hardship comes ease. (Qur`an, 94:5-6)

I know, not getting my "dream" internship is not a great hardship, especially when one considers the atrocities happening in Syria as we speak. Nonetheless, I'm still incredibly grateful for the beautiful new opportunity I have to live my dream of contributing to the Palestinian struggle for freedom and rights. Yes, I got an internship. It's three months long and in Gaza City. Details below:

And you can rest assured I quickly accepted and thanked this kind person for making my dreams come true, in a less obsessive kind of way. The fun part is, I have to keep this a secret from my entire family in Gaza because this was my parents' request in exchange for giving me permission to do what they should have done decades ago, go home.

What I'm most excited about: working, meeting other activists, Palestinian figs and jummeiz, swimming in the sea, Ramadan in the Muslim world, Friday demonstrations at the Red Cross, hanging out with my cousins, really getting to know my freed prisoner uncle, and being Palestinian.

Gaza, I can't wait to spend 11 weeks of bliss with you and give every ounce of my activist being to your freedom and dignity!

P.S. My mother is dropping me off in Gaza and my father is picking me up from Egypt. Yes, I am a toddler. But I'm not complaining!

Sympathetic Dictators

2012-02-18T15:25:00.002-06:00

Don't let the title fool you, there are no sympathetic dictators. Pathetic, yes. Sympathetic, no.

I don't know if any of you are old enough to remember the first Gulf War, I know I'm not, but much of what is happening today can be better understood by looking at that period of our world's history.

As you know, it began with Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait and then all of the countries in the Middle East and all of the world powers chose a side. Most chose Kuwait's side because it was the invadee, had a huge oil supply, Saddam was seen as a threat, and Gulf countries stick together to prevent the spread of violence and unrest (which could lead to fluctuations in oil prices and could shake the unyielding power of the monarchies).

I'm not going to go through the entire history of the Gulf War, I just want to call your attention to something I have a very hard time understanding about that period of time and it's relations to Palestine today. As I said, most nations chose to support Kuwait in the Gulf War and Saddam's Iraq suffered greatly as a result. Well, there was one "nation" that did not support Kuwait: Palestine. Yasser Arafat and most other Palestinians supported Saddam's attack on his neighbor. I know, this makes little sense; we are a people who suffer greatly as a result of military invasion, war, occupation, and violence, how can we then support these same actions against our Arab and Muslim brothers and sisters? The motivation was selfish and the result was harsh.

Saddam was always a friend of Palestine's. He despised Israel, as I believe most justice-loving people should (because a human rights violating pariah states deserve condemnation), and he used his nation's oil money to prove his passion. He sent money the families that lost their breadwinners to violence and helped families that were in need. As a result, Palestinians thought they owed this aggressor and ethnic cleansing tyrant their undying loyalty. (My father would kill me if he ever knew I wrote that last sentence.)

I wonder, though, how we can show so much love to a man who killed thousands of Kurds and abused the Shia population of his nation (both of whom are Muslim groups, in spite of what many fringe groups might say about the Shia) when he committed the same kinds of actions against his people that he claimed to condemn when we were the victims. He is a hypocrite. Even if he did us a few favors, we owe or lives and sustenance to God, not the criminal who offered money to bereaved families. Not that I am discrediting the vital importance of this aid, granted it was needed when it was given, but our collective conscience should not be bought so cheaply. Not at the expense of others' lives and dignity.

My father has a friend, a true pan-Arabist. This man is Jordanian, he has a daughter named after the Syrian capital and almost succeeded in naming his second daughter after the Iraqi capital, she ended up with a much more run-of-the-mill classic Arab name, to her mother's satisfaction. I was with my father and this man once driving somewhere when Mr. Pan-Arabist began talking about Saddam. He would only refer to him as al-shaheed al-mar7oom (the mercy-granted martyr; clearly this doesn't translate well) Saddam Hussein. He began sobbing like a child as he spoke about him. It was one of the most awkward moments of my life because my father, who was driving, just pretended like the 60 year old man next to him wasn't crying and I could not understand how he could have so much compassion for a heartless dictator.

Another incident similar to this occurred involving my father the day Saddam was killed. It was Eid ul-Fitr, if you remember. We were coming home from our family friend's house. While my father was at these people's house, he found a book of poetry about Palestine and spent the majority of our visit with his nose in this book. As my father drove his wife and four children home on the second most celebrated day in the Islamic calendar, he began reciting one of the poems he read and then he tied it to the murder of Saddam and said that the Palestinian cause was going to die along with him. Then he fell apart and began sobbing. At the wheel. At night. With his entire family in the car. My mother panicked, "Pull yourself together, you're going to get all of us killed!" she yelled. My father calmed himself down and we drove in silence for the rest of the trip home. I have only seen my father cry twice: when his mother died and on this night.

Now, let me clarify: the second Gulf War was illegal. The US and NATO has no right to invade Iraq, no matter how much they hated Iraq's leader or any other agenda item they wanted to forcefully advance. I am in no way supporting violence against the Iraqi people or even Saddam himself, and to be honest I was disgusted when I saw how he was killed. I think you need to treat all people with dignity and that death should not be advertised for the whole world to see. BUT, I also think that right is right and wrong is wrong. Even if he gave millions in aid to Palestine, we can't defend wrong and inhumane actions; not in Palestine, not in Iraq, not in Kuwait, not in Rawanda, not in Bosnia, not in Kashmir, no where.

What were the consequences of Palestine's stance with Saddam? Thousands of Palestinian refugees were kicked out of Kuwait and forced to flee to nations all over the world. The Kuwaiti-Palestinians I know are spread everywhere from Jordan, to Australia, to the U.S., and likely nearly every European country as well. Was this Kuwaiti reaction justified? Absolutely not, but it does not surprise me.

One of the major reasons this issue worries me is that there are a lot of dictators worldwide who in their hate for colonization, imperialism, and the West decide to support the Palestinian cause. Are we, as Palestinians, going to defend their illegal, inhumane, and unjust policies because they support our cause? I sincerely hope not.

Husni Mubarak was easy. He was the enemy of Palestine, so we hated him either way.

Qaddafi supported Palestine and even let the PLO work out of his country and gave arms to our freedom fighters for a long period of time. He's also a dictator, a psycho, a murderer, and made blasphemous comments about the Quran and Sunnah. I'm proud to say that I don't know any Palestinians that supported him, before the revolution or after.

Bashar al-Assad. What do we say about him? He's evil. He's a murderer, a tyrant, power hungry, has no dignity or pride, and deserves what he has coming. I have not heard any Palestinians verbalize a want for him to remain in power, but I'm sure some exist. A Christian Syrian my father knows who is pro-regime explained his stance to my father in this way: Bashar is one of the few Arab leaders who has not submitted to the U.S. and Israel, if he goes, then so does support for Palestine in the Middle East and dissent against Western policy in our region. How lame. I think his true motivation lies in that he is a Christian, a minority religious group in Syria, and this is something he shares with Assad's religious tradition: the Alawi sect of Shia Islam. I think this pro-regime Syrian is just afraid of the majority Sunnis taking power and abusing the minority groups. His support for a murderous tyrant, however, only fuels the exact reaction he is attempting to prevent. If the majority Sunnis know all of the Christians supported Bashar, then they will not treat the Christians kindly when they eventually gain power. And they will gain power.

I just don't understand this selfish sympathy people have for dictators. Saddam was bad, even if he was good to us. Qaddafi was bad, even if he was good to us. Bashar is bad, even if he was good to us. Why can't people separate the two? Has anyone else noticed this phenomenon, or am I living in some parallel universe?

Carrying the World's Despair on My Shoulders

2012-02-10T16:10:00.001-06:00

Whenever the world's problems seem too much for me to bear, I always run to my mother's welcoming arms for a good cry. This was one of those days... actually this whole week was.

What's bothering me:

(1) There may not be a Homs, Syria, a few days from now. Their water tanks have been destroyed, there is shooting and bombing in the streets everyday, dozens upon dozens are dying, the clinics can't treat all of the injured, they can barely bury all of the bodies before more come pouring in, people don't have food to eat, no one feels safe, entire families are being massacred at once, Russia and China are disgusting human rights abusers that passively encourage these murders, there are still pro-regime Syrians out there, and I can't handle it all. I can't think that these people are being murdered in such huge numbers and the world is sitting idle. And I am sitting idle.

(2) Khader Adnan has lost one-third of his body weight. He hasn't eaten in 55 days. He hasn't showered or brushed his teeth in 55 days. He hasn't been charged with a crime, there is no evidence against him, and he hasn't had a fair trial. Khader Adnan is shackled to his bed and dying a slow and painful death. His organ systems are dangerously close to shutting down. His wife is pregnant. He's 33, his life is only beginning. Amnesty International has called for his release. There has been an international call to action. No one has acted.

(3) The 2012 Republican primaries are so full of bigoted, close-minded, short-sighted, and hate-spewing candidates that I feel like I'm watching my country collapse.

(4) Iran. Ya Allah. I can't imagine what will happen if Israel and/or the U.S. attack Iran. She has a population of 70 million. The U.S. killed over 5% of Iraq's entire population, over 1.5 million people. What will we do to Iran? Iran hasn't broken a single law. She hasn't violated the Non-Proliferation Treaty. I just can't understand how these threats are even allowed to be made. You know what world? If this is about Israel being called a "cancerous tumor" in the Middle East, then I'll take the fall for Iran. I said it. I'm the one who called Israel a cancerous tumor, and while I'm at it, I will call Israel AIDS and malaria and polio and small pox and chicken pox and the common cold and a sore throat. Are those really fighting words? Are you really going to declare war over some he-said, she-said BS? Are we in junior high?

Every time I think of any of these things, and I think about them constantly, I feel sick to my stomach, I get depressed, and I feel powerless, hopeless, and frustrated. It's hard for me to see the importance of writing an artificial research paper (artificial because they give us the research and ask us to use the "relevant" elements to write our paper) or do silly readings about haunted houses (we are seriously talking about poltergeists in property law) when there are so many more important life and death issues that need to be resolved immediately and are more in need of my attention and action.

When I tell my mother about these things that bother me, because my friends are tired of hearing about it or don't care, she looks at me confused and with sympathy and says, "Mama, why do you carry the despair of the world on your shoulders? You're young, you shouldn't worry this much. Leave those problems for the people who can fix them and go study."

My answer is always the same, "But Mama, if I don't worry about these people who are dying or soon will be dying, then who will? No one else cares. No one else is doing anything. I'm not young, this world is going to be mine very soon and I need to be prepared to fix it. My generation can't keep leaving things for your generation to fix, we have to take action too."

And she just looks at me bewildered and gives me the hug I desperately need.

Have you ever seen "The Immortals"? If you have, then you remember the girl from "Slumdog Millionaire" playing the oracle in the movie. Well, every time I go through one of these episodes when I feel like the weight of the world is crashing down on me and like things are going so terribly and I can't do anything to fix it, I think of this oracle that she played. At one point in the film, she describes her ability to see the future as both a gift and a curse. A gift because she can protect the people of the world from disaster by seeing the disaster before it happens, and a curse because these visions constantly haunt her and plague her days and nights with worry.

I'm happy that my heart is sensitive enough to feel the suffering of others and I would much rather be compassionate than apathetic, but why do I do this to myself? Why don't I, like other girls of my demographic, just paint my nails and eat a fruit parfait and move on? Whatever the reason is, I'm glad for it, I just hope I can learn a better way to cope. A more productive way to cope.

Creatively BDSing

2012-02-08T19:21:00.002-06:00

My life is so boring. Here's another post that involves me sitting in class and getting bored.

Ok, so I'm very much a BDS (boycott, divestment, and sanctions) supporter and I'm in a BDS group in my community that was created one week before I joined it. I wish I could take credit for the group, but three white people were the geniuses behind the idea. One 70-something retired nurse active with the Green Party that may be my best friend in this world and has a house full of trinkets I have brought her from Gaza, a 50-something nurse and animal rights activist who's really into yoga and is an impeccable proof-reader, and finally a 23-year-old gay man I want to college with whose family doesn't know about his sexual orientation nor his Palestine activism. What a great mix we are! For the longest time, I was the only Palestinian in our group, but now we're up to two! Yippee!

Ever since I have gotten involved with this group, I have been obsessed with staying away from every BDS targeted product and corporation (as should you!). We don't buy Sabra hummus, I don't shop at Ulta because they sell Ahava makeup and lotions, and I try really hard not to go to H&M (but often fail). I know, I sound like a very bad BDS-er, but I really am better about it than I sound. I never ate yogurt in Gaza because almost every brand I saw was Israeli and I would buy the more expensive and less delicious Palestinian cookies to make a point "not to buy into occupation."

Anyway, one day I opened my fridge at home and saw something frightening. I bottle of heavy whipping cream with "Promised Land" written across the label. The BDS activist inside of me exploded in rage. I have taught my family not to buy anything that was made in Israel, the West Bank, or the Jordan Valley and then I find this evil product in my fridge? I was able to get my Arab mother to wash and dry her plastics and recycle them, but I can't get her to keep from buying Israeli dairy products? What is going on here? I picked up the bottle holding it like it was going to infect me with AIDS or like it was covered in bacon and turned it slowly in my hand to see where it was made. Texas. What? Yes, Texas. Only in the Bible-freaking-belt will you find a company that names its dairy brand "Promised Land." Their brand motto is: "Heavenly taste that just comes naturally." Also, they quote this Biblical verse on their bottles: And he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. Deuteronomy 26:9

[Not my photo. IDK why but I always feel bad about having other people's photos on this blog. Hope you kids don't mind.]

This doesn't sound like a BDS story does it? I'm getting there don't worry.

A few days later, I was bored in my contract law class and I decided to look up this company to see if they have some kind of sketchy relationship with the "Promised Land" most people think of first. I opened a new window and typed the name of the company in the search bar and began reading. The guy sitting next to me, who happens to be the only person in my class of 90 who knows anything at all about Palestine, leaned over, looked at my screen, and gave me a puzzled look. I smiled and told him I'd explain after class. I was so excited to share with this guy some information about the incredible movement I was a part of: BDS!

After class I turned to him and explained to him that I was part of this movement that promotes the boycott, divestment, and sanctions of Israel in order to force Israel to stop violating international, humanitarian, and human rights law and that we model our movement after the South African movement that ended apartheid. He looked at me shocked and said, "Wow. I was just surprised you were looking up milk instead of being on facebook." So, he's not a BDS activist after that little encounter, but I was excited to tell even one person about this incredible movement I am a part of. Maybe one day when he's practicing law and he's best friends with the next Texas governor to run for president, he'll tell his powerful friend about this movement and convince him to have a more equitable, fair, and balanced views toward Israel. Then Israel will be too broke to bomb Gaza every night and we'll all live happily ever after. Or maybe I should go study. I think the second option is best.

Crushing Defeat

2012-02-08T18:45:00.002-06:00

As I was sitting in my tort law class Tuesday morning, I got bored of listening to my professor badger my unlucky classmate who served as the Socratic method's victim for the 50 minute class period. We were talking about intentional infliction of emotional distress, sounds interesting right? It actually is. None of this is relevant to the subject of my post. It's just never easy to talk about defeat, so I have distracted myself from it for a few sentences.

During class, I decided to check my email and see if I heard back from UNRWA about an opportunity to intern with them this summer. I have been imagining my summer at the UNRW headquarters behind the Islamic University of Gaza for the past month and a half. I knew what I would wear to work my first day, what I would tell the taxi driver in the morning, I planned to meet with my cousins who are students at IUG for lunch a few times a week, I planned my entire summer around it. I was dying to get this internship.

A little background:
UNRWA offers legal internships at two of its headquarters: one in Amman, Jordan, and one in New York City. I sent a general application for their summer legal internship program and I did something a little more creative. UNRWA policy is that for international employees, Gaza is not a family location. UNRWA employees who are not Palestinian refugees are not permitted to bring their families to Gaza with them for two reasons: (1) it's unsafe and (2) it's difficult to enter. For these same policy reasons, UNRWA does not offer any kind of internships at the Gaza City headquarters. And this is why the Gaza offices have no established internship program to offer. I knew this going in. I still tried.

I emailed every email address I could find online for the Gaza City offices and I wrote down the phone numbers and called them while I was in Gaza on a daily basis. Finally, I was directed to the right person and I was able to speak with one of the two lawyers working at the Gaza City field office. This kind gentleman answered my questions and told me we could schedule a phone interview for when I returned to the U.S. because he would be on leave for the entire duration of my trip, meaning we'd never both be in Gaza at the same time. I was disappointed, but at least I got an interview.

I told them that I had Palestinian citizenship and that traveling in and out of Gaza was not difficult for me and they did not have to worry about "safety" issues because, like every other Palestinian, my safety is a non-issue. I told them that I realized they had no structured internship program and I knew that if they took me up on my offer, we would make things up as we went. I thought the interview went okay, it wasn't perfect but I think I made my motives clear and I also showed them that I had done my research and that I was serious about my dedication to their agency.

Apparently they didn't agree.

Back to reality:
This is where the "crushing defeat" part of this post comes in. I was devastated. I wanted to cry, right there in the middle of my tort class's discussion of intentional infliction of emotional distress. How appropriate.

I don't know how to cope with defeat. Want another example? I got my grades a couple of weeks ago and they were dreadful. I was mortified when I saw them. If you've read my first few posts, then your know how academically brilliant I have always (wrongly) thought myself to be. Imagine my shock when I realized that in law school, I am simply mediocre. I'm not even in the top third of my class. I'm closer to the half way mark than the top third mark. I don't understand how this happened. How am I all of a sudden just average? It's utterly shameful. In addition to losing my confidence, I no longer have any motivation to try in my classes. I worked so hard last semester and it got me to the abysmal and undistinguished middle of my class. There are very few students who worked as hard as I did, but somehow 80 of them did better than me.

This internship was supposed to give me the motivation to soldier through the rest of this semester so I could go to Gaza and reinvigorate my passion for getting a law degree. Now I'm hopeless and lazy and fell incompetent.

Please don't misread this as me needing a pep-talk or me fishing for compliments. I don't need someone to help me see the silver lining. I just want to sulk. I realize how spoiled I sound, but if anything, that has been the greatest lesson I have learned through this. I will not always get what I want. I have accepted this when it comes to living arrangements and marriage proposals, but school was the one thing I was always able to have my way. Now I can't even work that part of my life the way I want. My credentials and experience were not enough to get me my dream (UNPAID) internship and they're just average enough to keep me from accomplishing anything major here. What now?

Strangely Western

2012-01-29T00:01:00.002-06:00

I have often wondered what I would have been like had I grown-up in Palestine instead of the U.S. There are strange ways that our environment influences us that we don't realize until we are engulfed in another culture. This post is dedicated to the strangely western characteristics I have noticed in myself.

(1) This one is embarrassing. Americans have dirty minds, and I am an American. I'm also a sheltered, innocent Arab girl so I didn't realize how perverted my thoughts could be until I spent time with my older, single cousin in Gaza. We had just spent the day in the Rimal district of Gaza City, the Gaza Strip's shopping capital. I have a strange obsession with a Palestinian sweet called 3awwameh (pictured below), which is like a Palestinian donut hole except double-fried and thus crunchy. While we were out, we bought some and took it home to eat. OF COURSE we were not able to eat any of it while we were out because, first, my cousin wears niqab (face veil) so it would have been difficult for her, and second it is a major taboo in Gaza for a girl to eat in the street. When we returned to my house, the electricity was out and neither one of us knew how to work the generator, so we illuminated the room with the light of my cell phone. As we drank our tea and ate our 3awwameh, we tried on all of the cute things we had purchased that day.

When we were full, I noticed that there were two pieces of 3awwameh left and one of the asabe3 zeinab (the long kind). The three left over pieces had somehow arranged themselves on the plate so that the two round ones were a base beneath the long one. I looked down and couldn't help but laugh when I saw this serendipitous arrangement. My cousin inquired about the cause of my laughter and I just pointed at the plate. She looked at me confused and I just said, "look at the color and the arrangement of the 3awwameh." She stared at me blankly. I was so embarrassed; how could I have such a filthy and over active imagination? I immediately tried to change the subject and forget the conversation ever happened. I'm such an immature little American.

(2) My voice is so loud. Girls in Gaza keep from laughing in the street, talking on their cell phones, eating (as I mentioned earlier), and speaking loudly as to avoid calling attention to themselves. As a Muslim woman who wears hijab in the U.S., I'm pretty used to getting stared at, and adjusting the volume of my voice won't make me any less conspicuous. Clearly, I have never felt the need to speak softly. Additionally, people in Gaza see soft-spokenness as an element of modesty. Being a Muslim woman in the U.S., all it takes for me to be modest is to wear long sleeves in the summer and instantly I am at the level of a nun in modesty, even if I belly dance in the street. I have never seen the volume of my voice as a contributor to my modesty. I don't wear makeup on a daily basis and I don't wear perfume when I leave the house; that's how I preserve my modesty. Basically, no matter how hard I try to remember that Gazans expect women to speak with low voices when they are in public, I still end up shouting like a maniac and laughing like a hyena ever time I leave the house.

(3) I don't know how to change who I am to please others. This sounds very un-western, I know, but allow me to explain. As a Muslimah who wore hijab and was in junior high when September 11th happened, I had to be secure with who I was and what I stood for pretty young in life to keep from being swayed by the lack of acceptance I'd face. I learned to accept that I was different from others and that I ascribed to a different value system from those around me. If I was going to persevere and live the lifestyle I wanted to live, I had to make sure I never compromised who I was and what I believed in to please others. I wasn't going to change my beliefs, dress, or manners for anyone else. I needed to be sure of myself and love the uniqueness of who I was as a Muslim woman so that I could survive the stress and pressures of junior high, high school, and college.

For the most part, I have stuck to that pretty well, I think. But when I went to Gaza, I saw that this was not a quality women in Gaza possessed. All the girls I met in Gaza regularly sacrificed parts of who they were and what they wanted and their belief system in order to please their parents or fit into social norms. For example, if it was not socially acceptable for a girl to choose a certain major in college, she chose a different major. If society did not accept girls wearing certain flamboyant colors or tighter fitting clothing, they didn't wear it. I'm all for dressing modestly for the sake of God, but changing how you dress to make others happy is ridiculous. What I had trouble with was how people constantly made me feel like I was walking around naked because I wasn't wearing a 3abaya (long, black, loose fitting garment for women). My clothes were all perfectly halal (permitted); I wore long, loose maxi dresses. But apparently, in the eyes of Gazan society, color is forbidden.

I couldn't bring myself to change the way I dressed because people were so rude as to stare at me when I walked past them. If God doesn't have a problem with how I am dressed, why should I change how I dress to please strangers in the street? Gazan girls have no problem doing it, but my Muslim-American sense of pride and confidence made me unable to do that.

(4) Body image issues. I don't have body dysmorphic disorder or anything like that and I'm not obese. I don't suffer from mental anguish because of my appearance, but I have noticed that girls in the U.S. are a lot more body conscious than girls in Gaza.

Exhibit one: I have been on a diet almost every day of my life since I was eleven. Like I said, I don't have major weight issues, but I am prone to gain weight just by walking past a cheeseburger or bag of chips. I was aware of the nature of my body to quickly expand, so I did my best to prevent this from happening. In my adolescent eyes, getting fat was the worst thing that could happen to me. Maybe dying would be worse, or maybe not. Either way, being fat was not an option. I have always had clothes that were designated "fat clothes" to wear on days when I felt fat or bloated and "skinny clothes" when I was feeling fabulous and thin. This all sounds so superficial and petty, and I recognize that and this is precisely the reason why I am writing about it. I don't think I would have these strange hangups if I was not raised in the superficial, consumerist, over-sexualized, commercial United States.

Exhibit two: panty lines, bra straps, and undone hair. An American girl would never leave her house if she had any one of the items mentioned in that list showing. Gazan girls will have a perfectly sculpted hijab very time they leave the house with 839821 pins to secure each fold and crease, but when they go to a wedding or party, this attention to detail ceases. Gazan girls see nothing wrong with panty lines and bra straps and I envy them for it. There are many more important things in life than if your undergarments are perfect. I could never take off my scarf at a gathering if my hair were not fixed and ready to be put on display; Gazan girls will be the life of the party with flat, matted hair tossed into a bun. I wish I could be that carefree. I was speaking to my fellow Palestinian-American friend about this subject and she told me something that very elaborately proves my point: if she can't find the right bra to go with a dress, she will return it, no matter how much she loves it or how perfect it is for the occasion. American girls are way too sensitive about and obsessed with their looks.

I think the root of this issue is how commercial our lives have become. We, women, realize that our bodies are used to sell products and that a beautiful body can only be what the images on advertisements show. As different as our bodies are from those images, the more unattractive we are, and the more unattractive we are, the less worth we have. No one can deny that women are instantly judged based on their appearances by almost everyone they encounter. We, American women, realize this and as much as we try to push past these thoughts, they always find their way back and make us feel insecure about our looks in general and bodies in particular.

(5) Cousin marriages disgust me. There's not much more to say about that, really, except that Palestinians don't feel the same way.

I'll try to add to this list as time progresses, but for now, these are the ways I am strangely Western.

What I DON'T Miss About Gaza

2012-01-28T16:28:00.000-06:00

Ok, this may seem random, but I clearly am not an experienced blogger as my 300 views in 9 months show, so bear with me. I just realized I can post videos on this thing, so here's a video I shot my last day in Gaza, January 2nd, 2012.

Maghazi Refugee Camp

A Matter of Principle

2012-01-28T16:00:00.005-06:00

My legal career began in April 2011, when I began interviewing for scholarships. This was my first opportunity to open doors to meeting the people and making the contacts that can help me get a footing in the legal market I hoped to be a part of. My issue, however, is that I never planned to be part of that legal market. I never even wanted to be a lawyer. Thus these contacts that I was making were not the contacts I needed in order to establish myself in the field I wanted to join.

If you have not already noticed, I write a post for this blog when I need to sort my thoughts, when things seem overwhelming, or when I feel like I discovered a world truth and I don't have the time to write a treatise on it.

This summer is my first step toward building the legal career I want, which may not even involve the practice of law at all. My problem is that I don't know what I want to do with my life and I'm afraid of making the wrong choice this summer. 1Ls (what everyone calls first year law students) are expected to intern or clerk their first summer of law school in order to help them decide what area of law they want to work in, to build contacts in the legal community, and to gain experience. The place they intern help shape the kind of lawyer they will end up being and the career they will one day have. Basically, this summer will determine my future, so I need to make the right decision.

Generally, law students will aim to get an internship at one of the largest law firms in their area, they will try to earn a clerkship with a judge, they may study abroad at a sister law school their law school is associated with in another country, or they will complete their public service hours. I want to go to Gaza, no surprise there. I try to go there as often as I can and recently, I found great success in this effort. As I try to decide where I would like to intern, I ponder my purpose in life. Just kidding. But really, I am trying to get to the heart of what I want out of my career, what kind of work I want to do on a daily basis, what areas of society I want to impact, where my passions and values lie, and how I can translate what's important to me and my activism into a career.

A woman has to make a lot of sacrifices to maintain her career and I want to make sure that what I end up doing is worth the sacrifice. I know I want to live and work in Gaza, but I want to have some of the comforts of an American life while reaping the benefits of my extensive education. Whatever I do, I will do it for the purpose of pleasing God, serving my religion, and improving the lives of Palestinians. And somehow I need to find a career where I can do all of that using a law degree.

Let me first explain where my passions lie and then explore the two options I have come up with. In applying to law school, I had two major grievances about the world as I saw it and these were my motivations for taking this route. First, I was fed up with how the American government treats Muslim-Americans. I thought the PATRIOT Act was Bush's pre-emptive strategy of defense at work against the American public. I thought the FBI's fascination with American mosques and clerics was unfounded and a waste of resources. I wanted to run for political office and repeal the PATRIOT Act and end the persecution of Muslims and Muslim institutions. My second grievance related more to my homeland. I wanted to serve the Palestinian cause. I asked myself how I would be able to face God on the day of judgment and answer His questions about how I sat idle while my brothers and sisters suffered in Palestine; how did I allow Al-Quds to be stolen from us; how did I not protect His blessed land from torture and rape. SO my goal was to work for the UN while living in Gaza and re-vamp their focus back to where it should have always been: finding a permanent, just, and peaceful solution to the Palestinian-Israeli impasse.

After going to Gaza last year, all of my passion behind grievance one fizzled away and my only purpose in life became to address grievance two. The next question became how. I wanted to do work relating to human rights and international law, but as an American. I wanted to have a position of authority that meant my voice would be heard so that the cries of Palestinian mothers and peace activists and resistance fighters could finally be heard worldwide. I wanted to use my American background as a platform for the Palestinian cause, but from Palestine. The biggest issues I wanted to address were: the right of return, economic prosperity for all Palestinians in their hometowns by granting them water rights and control of their borders to facilitate trade, the release of all political prisoners, the transformation of Israel from a militaristic and hostile enemy to Palestinians into the co-workers and neighbors Palestinians shared their homeland with, and equality among all people of all religions and persuasions as citizens of one democratic state.

Now that you understand what I want, let me explain to you the options I have (or at least the ones I know I have).

First, I can work as a lawyer. The benefits of working as a lawyer right out of law school include that I can apply my legal education and training in the way they were intended to be used, right away, building experience in case I later want a traditional legal career. This gives me the option of returning to the U.S. and working at a law firm if my Palestinian dream ends up being a nightmare and my family was right about me not being able to withstand the torment of life in Gaza. I hope this fear of ours is never actualized. Also, trying the lawyer thing out for a while will help me decide if this path is really the one I want to take before I dismiss it.

This option relates to my summer because one place I can intern is UNRWA which employs lawyers from all over the world to provide legal protection and oversee the basic functioning of this huge bureaucracy. Their practice involves administrative law, employment law, and contract law, for the most part. That means my dream of addressing grievance two will not be met right away. I will simply be part of a bureaucracy that somewhat contradicts the exact policies I hope to advance. UNRWA may provide a lot of services that make the lives of Palestinians more bearable, but they do not promote nearly any of the principles I believe in. They do not aim to bring the refugees back to their hometowns, they want to provide them with just enough so that they can forget about their hometowns. They don't want them to prosper, they want them to have enough food in their stomachs so that they don't revolt in the streets demanding their rights. They don't want equality for Palestinians and Israelis, they want to maintain the status quo with as little noise and bloodshed as possible. They want to keep Palestinians subservient to the rest of the world and force us to continue to live off of handouts for the rest of time. I don't know how I can support this. We are a people with dignity and pride and we deserve better. Even though UNRWA is the largest employer in Gaza, they provide subsidies to refugees, they educate Gaza's children, and they furnish Palestinian society with many of the civil services they need, they don't promote any of the principles I stand for.

My second option is to intern with a Palestinian NGO. I know, that sounds so familiar. It's exactly what I did for the two months I was in Gaza from November 2010 until January 2011, but this time I hope it will be different. According to the director there with whom I have been in contact, my work will consist of: "documenting human rights and IHL violations, work[ing] on cases with lawyers, do[ing] legal research to support litigation, and deal[ing] with communications with UN special procedures. Reporting and editing are also permanent components in the internships we offer." If that's not perfect for me, I don't know what is. This fits exactly within the parameters that I set for myself and I will be working for a Palestinian organization* and contributing to the strengthening of Palestinian civil society. I know that my last experience was less than ideal, but it helped me see the true face of occupation as I met the families of victims of extra-judicial assassinations, young men murdered in front of their homes on the buffer zone, and those who died for pointless reasons because some hot-tempered or substance abusing person had access to a weapon. I also learned about the struggles that Palestinian farmers and fishermen endure, the inadequacies of Gaza's health services, the impact of pollution and lack of sewage treatment facilities on the health of Palestinians, the realities of having an economy based on tunnel smuggling, and countless other issues that Palestinians face. I think that this type of work along with my outside activism with other groups can help me make the difference I want to make regarding grievance two while not compromising my principles.

Although this is not at all a motivating factor, the internship at the NGO pays. As nice as it will be to have the cost of my airline ticket offset, I am not willing to make a decision this big simply for the sake of a few hundred (possibly more) dollars. In the end, however, if UNRWA hires me, they will pay me much more and give me much better benefits and grant me a six week paid vacation where I can travel to the U.S. and visit my family every year. It's a hard decision and I feel torn. Either way, I'm glad I won't be in Texas this summer. (I haven't had the big talk with my parents yet, but I feel like I can get them to see things my way. In Shaa Allah it all works out.)

*This NGO is funded by American and European groups, so I'm not sure how thoroughly "Palestinian" it actually is, even if it is Gaza-based and all of its employees are Palestinian. This may mean the analysis I gave of UNRWA's motivations may also apply to Palestinian NGOs, but I'm not prepared to make that leap yet.

Not what I'll be doing, but an example of one of the services UNRWA provides

Another service UNRWA provides, emptying dumpsters

Gaza Story: Laundry

2012-01-25T19:51:00.008-06:00

This post sounds like it's going to be really boring, right? How does one tell a story about laundry and expect others will want to read it? I'm not sure, that's why I'm not actually writing about laundry. I wasn't lying up there in the title, the story involves laundry, but the lessons to be learned from it are not the diverse ways in which people around the world dry their clothes. The lesson to learn here is about how dehumanizing the occupation is, how degrading life in a refugee camp can be, and the creative ways Palestinians combat both.

As you walk through any Palestinian refugee camp, you notice gray, lots and lots of gray. The walls enclosing the tiny homes overflowing with young children are gray. The gates closing off the larger estates of refugees who were miraculously able to save enough to purchase some land around their house are gray. The mosques and corner stores and bakeries and small shops are gray. Camps are a sea of gray and there are two things in the camps that add a splash of color its walls, a reminder that personality and imagination and humanity exist here. These things are graffiti and clothes. If you are confused by the second item on my two item list, don't be. I am well aware that clothes are worn by humans and not by buildings, but the streets and rooftops of Gaza are where her wet clothes dry.

As you walk through the narrow alleyways of Gaza's refugee camps, you often have to bob and weave to keep from smacking your head against the damp clothes of the people living in the nearby homes. You see towels and blankets, the blue and white stripped uniforms of young girls in elementary and middle school, jeans small enough to fit a three year old, the long dark abaya of a girl clearly too short for the garment as the worn hem suggests, the Barcelona soccer jersey of the boy who probably spray-painted the name of the team ten feet away on the neighbor's wall, the white undershirts of a man who is probably the father of the children whose clothes you just leaned to the right to keep from hitting, and the array of different colored and floral patterned scarves of the woman who washed all of these clothes and gave every ounce of herself to the family in the home on the other side of that wall in front of you. You can smell the scent of their detergent and the water dripping from the garments has fallen onto your shoes.

Each family has a strategic way of hanging their clothes so that passersby and neighbors don't know what color underwear they wore yesterday. Some hide them under the drying scarves that usually veil women's hair, some hang them on the lines closest to house so the bigger garments on the outermost lines hide them, and some dry them inside the house. Even when the densely populated camps make you feel as if your sense of privacy could never be compromised because you never possessed one, Mothers find a way to preserve this small bit of humanity and liberty that Palestinians refuse to give up.

Mothers have learned that the heavier clothes need to be hung early when the sun reaches the alley so that the clothes can dry before dusk. They learn to move the clothes west with the sun as it begins its daily setting. The uniforms the children wore today are now dirty and the only other ones are drying on the line, they must dry. Very often, however, the sun never reaches the alleys or the neighbors are so many that they have claimed all of the areas the sun reaches. Where will the family's laundry hang? During my adventurous strolls through the camps of the Gaza Strip, I have discovered some interesting answers to that question.

Most of the houses in the camps don't have proper rooftops and their roofs are sealed with a single layer of tin that shields them from the moisture of the rain, but not from the noise of every rain drop or the wrestling alley cats or the passing voices in the alley. When there is no proper roof, there are much fewer options for where laundry can hang to dry. This is where Gaza's creativity shows and my story begins.

I was walking through Rafah refugee camp with my mother when I noticed something strange, a road so wide that the northbound side was separated from the southbound side by a narrow median. Roads in camps are generally very narrow, rarely is there a road wide enough to have room for a median, but this was one such street. The next thing I noticed was even more shocking than how vast this road was. To my surprise, for the entire length of the median was a clothing line boldly boasting the apparel of a large family. This clothing line was not between houses, it was not in the center of a neighborhood, not even in front of a house. It hung in the center of a street in a commercial area, a road lined by shops selling everything you can imagine: sweets, clothing, grocery items, furniture, and wedding dresses.

I was shocked. Of all the strange places I have seen laundry hung in Gaza's camps, this was by far the most peculiar. I brought this unique display to my mother's attention and she explained to me what the likely reasons were behind this bold family's decision to hang their clothes in the middle of the busy two-way street. She said that in addition to the narrowness of the camp's allies, it is custom in Gaza that each son build a level above the family home after he has married and established his own family and this stacking of homes has reached the point that sun doesn't reach the alleys anymore, and without sun, clothes take several days to dry. Most refugee families don't have the luxury of waiting that long for their clothes, so this was a solution one family found to this problem.

Often when non-camp dwellers visit the camps they are shocked by what they see, everything seem so dirty and grimy and unkept, but we often don't ask the question of why things are this way. Why are the children barefoot? Why are the houses so old and broken? Why are there old non-functioning appliances and broken pieces of furniture crammed into the dead ends of the alleys? Why do people's clothes look so dirty and worn out? It's not because the refugees want it that way. It's not because they don't buy their children new shoes and clothes whenever they have the chance. It's not because they don't do laundry or clean their homes. It's not because they hate to throw things out. What you are seeing is poverty and poverty is not always beautiful, but it is human and very much a part of refugee life in the Gaza Strip. Poverty is just one way the occupation tried to destroy the spirit of the Palestinian people, but as the waving clothes on the Rafah camp median tell us, the Palestinian people stand tall and proud and their spirits cannot be weakened and their dignity cannot be diminished.

Maghazi Refugee Camp (November 2010)

An alley in Maghazi Camp (November 2010)

Deir el Balah Refugee Camp (November 2010)

Deir el Balah, this might be the camp or the city, sometimes it's hard to tell (November 2010)

Jabalia, again not sure if this is the city or the camp (December 2010)

Al Zahra district of Gaza City (December 2010)

Al Rimal district of Gaza City (December 2010)

My Worst Fear -Law School Edition

2012-01-20T17:34:00.002-06:00

The other night (Wednesday, January 18, 2012), my law school hosted an event where lawyers from all of the major firms in our city came, representing their firms, to our campus to speak with us. Each firm had their own table and offered us brochures and goodies like cookies, popcorn, candy, and t-shirts so that we will stop by and speak with them.

This was one of the first times I have spoken to lawyers for an extended period of time. I asked the people I met about their experience in law school, dealing with the disappointment of their first set of grades (my grades come out soon, pray for me!), getting a summer internship, and their practice. All in all, I enjoyed some pleasant conversation with a bunch of artificially friendly strangers who may soon be my colleagues.

You may be wondering, "What's to bad about that?" Well, I will tell you.

As I drove home that night, I thought about interning at these law firms and thought about what I'd wear to work and what my days and nights would consist of. I thought to myself, maybe being a lawyer in this city won't be the worst thing in the world. Then I began to picture my life as a Texan lawyer at a big law firm working with a bunch of people like those I met earlier that night. I pictured my big house, my fancy car, my spoiled kids and with all of their unnecessary electronic devices.... OH MY GOD! Then I panicked.

I did not go to law school to be a lawyer. I know, that makes little sense, but my goal was to be a policymaker, to effect change in the areas where I believe our nation and the world as a whole needs change. I thought, with this degree, I could do anything. I could be in Congress, I can advise the President, I can lobby in DC, I can be in freed Palestine's first parliament, I can help re-build and re-shape my liberated country. I swear these were all options I considered and am still considering.

I did not go to law school to live a wealthy, extravagant, isolated-from-the-real-world, money-centered life. I am here because I want to make a difference and no one will listen to a girl with a sociology and political science degree from a football college in Texas, so this was my way of making my voice a little more difficult to ignore. Although this little fantasy only lasted about three seconds, I spent the next three days wondering where I went wrong, what made these terrible thoughts enter my mind, and what I can do to ensure they never creep into my mind again.

One thing I did was immediately email the people I was talking to in Gaza about summer internships to inquire about my status with them, the next thing I did was start wearing a Palestine bracelet, and finally, I started listening to this beautiful nasheed everyday:

http://youtu.be/eaRvZLqJiL4

[Please ignore how ridiculous the video is and listen to the words.]

My point is, I'm really scared of selling out. I don't want to be like all of those other people who lose sight of what's important when they see that a six-figure salary is within their grasp. I've never been money obsessed and I hope I never will be, but I've also never had any so I am afraid. I'm also very lazy even though I'm driven (do those contradict?), so I'm afraid I will take the easy route and stay where things are comfortable and easy and familiar.

***

Strange fact: when I picture my sell-out life, I see two little fair skinned kids that are supposed to represent my progeny. They are about 3 and 5 years old and they're way too fashionably dressed and they each have an iPad in one hand and a Wii controller in the other. Isn't that weird?

Another strange fact: when I picture my potential awesome super-activist life, I have six little extra-tan kids who all look to be the same age and they speak Arabic and they're always running. I think it's funny that my future where I defeat Israel involves me having a litter of Arabic-speaking kids. This is funny to me because the strongest weapon we have against Israel is DEMOGRAPHICS! Muahahaha!

Question: why to I associate fair skin with selling out? I really don't get this.

The Most Insulting Proposal

2012-01-20T16:46:00.002-06:00

Wow. Well, the title kind of says it all. Like every Arab girl who has ever gone back home, I have received my fair share of awkward proposals. For the most part, my most embarrassing, hilarious, and strange proposals have come from members of my extended family. I will not go into detail about them because the story I will share blows them all out of the water.

When I went to Gaza last year, I got a few "cousband" offers. If you're wondering what a "cousband" is, do not worry, it's a made up word created by my dear friend. It is the result of a marriage between cousins and the term refers to the role the male serves in the relationship: he is both a cousin and a husband, or more aptly, a "cousband."

This most recent trip to Gaza involved a proposal very different from all of the past cousband offers I have received. Because I grew up in the U.S., the idea of marrying a cousin repulses me and I have no remorse regarding this and I don't hope to ever change my perspective. Because of this, I always find cousband offers quite hilarious, seeing them simply as ridiculous attempts at getting a visa to the U.S. Although this is always my first thought and the first thought of many Arab girls who receive cousband offers, out of common decency, the cousband/aunt/uncle making the offer never explicitly says this. This was not the case with my most recent cousband offer.

My dear, sweet aunt. I love her, I really do. Unfortunately, she is the mother of seven boys, five of whom are still unmarried. Also to my and her and their misfortune, none of these tall skinny boys excelled in school in even the slightest manner. But, like all other men, they each seek wealth. As many of you know, those who seek wealth often have a hard time finding it in Gaza. One of these boys left Gaza to work in the UAE. Another decided to get into the lucrative and risky business of tunnel smuggling for a while until this industry become highly regulated by the government he considers his greatest worldly enemy. Now, the tunnel son, his father, and two of his brothers are trying to find wealth a new way: amassing as many citizenships as they can. (The youngest son is still trying to escape high school, so he cannot join the rest of the family's efforts. I say "escape" because when one hates going to school and doesn't value education, this is pretty much the sentiment he has toward school.)

The present focus of this family of overgrown and underfed boys is Egypt. Yes, the citizenship they seek is the Egyptian citizenship. Everyone tells them that in the Arab world, this citizenship will get them nothing and in the rest of the world it will get them even less, but they are persistent.

The night before my family left Gaza, my aunt's husband saw an opportunity he hadn't noticed earlier: me. He spoke to my father and my mother, separately, to explain to them his plan. Here begins my devaluation, because apparently I am a commodity that can be purchased.

"We really love [48Refugee] and want her to be part of our family. I have five unmarried sons. She can have which ever one she wants. Even Mohammad. [He's four years younger than me.] We just want her. We will take good care of her and treat her well, don't worry. We'll pay you her weight in gold; anything to buy that American citizenship."

Yes, this is what this man said to my mother on January 1, 2012. And as he said this, my aunt, this man's wife, stood alongside him and nodded in agreement. I still love my aunt, I promise I do. I'm just not sure how much I like her.

By the way, I find it even more offensive that he didn't even bother to speak to his sons and ask them who would be willing to take on the burden of marrying their American cousin in order to help the family purchase the most prized possession in the world, American citizenship. He didn't even try. He assigned upon them all, as a homogenous group, the burden of serving as my cousband. Thanks.

That's my story. In the eyes of greater-Gaza, I am a walking, talking visa-grantor. If you offer enough cash and tall, skinny boys, I might just accept and grant you a chance at America and her great wealth.

From left to right: Mama, my Aunt, her granddaughter, and tall&skinny Mohammad.

Gaza 2011-2012 Blogs

2012-01-20T16:19:00.003-06:00

I really did try to blog when I was in Gaza this past time, but my trip was so short and I had no privacy, because we did not stay in our own home this time, so I was unable. Here, however, is what I was able to put into words when I was in Gaza:

12/22/11

I’ve been in Gaza a total of 15 hours and I feel like I’ve never left. More of my cousins have babies, more of my aunts and uncles have become grandparents, and we’ve added a few new members to our family. But the greatest change remains the return of my beloved uncle. After over 20 years of incarceration, we have all prayed for and awaited the day he would return to us. Everyone wants to show me pictures of what they wore to his wedding and henna, they want to tell me about how beautifully they danced and how breathtaking their photos are. No matter what dresses, hairstyles, or amounts of makeup they wore, the beauty in their appearance is clearly the joy in their hearts physically manifested. The pleasure of having our family united and the bliss we felt in celebrating his return and all of the beautiful occasions that came with it will forever be remembered in the history of our family.**

I saw a rat today. I tried not to scream. I told myself, “You are in a refugee camp. Rats are part of life here. They are not invited guests, but like the Israelis, there’s not much we can do to rid ourselves of them.” As much beauty as I am able to find in the camps, the poverty and deprivation are impossible to escape.

12/24/11

My uncle is a new groom, people visit and invite him daily, he has no moments to spare, no time for small quiet gatherings. When I get the chance to sit with him, I want to tell him how sorry I am. [I did something stupid when he was in prison and got him in a lot of trouble.] How stupid, insignificant, inconsiderate, naïve, and misled that I am. I want to explain to him that I wish the suffering he faced because of me would me multiplied and targeted toward me instead of him for what I did. I want to tell him that I’m sorry, that it wasn’t my intention, that my goals were to help him and tell his story, to give a human face to the pain he faced so that others could understand that unjust policies and apartheid regimes are not just wrong, but they ruin lives, crush families, and must be deprived of their power and influence on the world we live in. I want to relieve myself of my intense guilt and shame for being the cause of so much of his suffering.

I want to tell him how shy I am to speak in front of him; how intimidating I find him; how, when I see him, I feel like I’m in the presence of a companion of the Prophet or a famed scholar; how he embodies so many of the qualities I wish to possess. I adore and admire and respect and honor him. He sacrificed half of his life for the sake for God, for the protection of his people, for the security of his nation, for the purpose of the uprising and empowerment of a never-defeated people. His selflessness is unfathomable, indescribable, unmatched by anyone I know, and hopefully adequately rewarded in this life and the hereafter. I want to tell my uncle that I strive to be like him, but I know my weaknesses well enough as to keep from expecting his level of courage. He has the temperament and outlook that I model myself after; he has the patience and steadfastness that pulses through the veins of generations of Palestinians, both warriors and pacifists; he has the personal qualities that, if possessed by all Palestinians, would make us the titans of the world we live in.

12/25/11

Christmas in the holy land.

There’s a dark cloud over my days here. I feel like there isn’t enough time to do anything. I wish there was a way to keep from sleeping so that I can do all that I want. I still haven’t even sat with my uncle and this trip was entirely for the purpose of seeing him. I got a cell phone last night, maybe that will be the first step to my independence so that I can step out of the over-protection that I’m under and do what I came to Gaza to do.

I want to go to the beach, I want to see the old historic mosques and churches in Gaza, I want to visit the place where I interned last year… there’s so much to see and do and I’m too depressed to do any of it.

**My uncle was released during the 2011 prisoner exchange and my trip to Gaza this winter was for the purpose of meeting him and welcoming him home. I have always cared deeply about the prisoner issue because of my close connection to it and below is a poem I wrote in 2007 about my dear uncle. (Keep in mind, I was a baby and have never been a talented poet. I am only posting this to show you how deeply I love my uncle, how much I think of him, and how exciting this period of time has been for my family.)

Angel Held Captive

You were the age of my brother

tender youth, growing wisdom

sacrifice, selflessness, courage, and strength

the strong arm ensuring our security

as we slept, you guarded us

many sleepless nights, fighting for our future.

Yearning to see the morning sun

striving to flee the torment of iron bars

the animals stole your freedom

but you will beat the enemy

he tries to weaken your spirit

dissolve your patience

you are stronger than the enemy

the animals shall not prevail.

We pray for your return

your freedom and our reunion

we dream about your wedding

but we are grateful

Others lose limbs, hearing, or vision

worse yet are those who are orphaned or widowed

but you, my uncle, have no bodily loss

only the most basic unalienable of rights

your loss is more painful, the loss of freedom

even so, you retain your dignity

you are humble and proud

a rock.

solid and strong.

reliable.

We seek to give you patience and hope

but conversely YOU fill our hearts with content

you help us find peace of mind and joy

help us appreciate what we take for granted

our walks in the free fresh air

taking a deep breath with every step

hands in pockets as we ponder

ponder the blessings we have been given

our feet follow a beat

as we kick that unclaimed, thrown out can

not a worry on our minds

not four life sentences on our shoulders.

I pray for the day of our reunion

the day our dreams are reality

and our prayers answered

your mother yells for joy

her youngest son, freed from captivity

she saves her little money

for the day she can help you complete your religion.

Angel in captivity

not hot-tempered

always caring

willing to share any calming word

constantly praising, thanking, and praying

to the One who deserves all glory.

Some lose their lives

others lose their chance

some lose a father, brother, or son

I lose my uncle

the angel in captivity.

One small memory, I am allowed to keep

my uncle protecting and preserving

all that is valued

the security of his nation

the lives of his people

and more directly, the sanctity of trust

the ones living next door

traitors, helping the monstrous animals

my uncle, all I have is my memory

the preservation of my honor

a lesson taught to a three year old

by a foreseeing wise man in his tender youth.

Some lose limbs, hearing , or vision

you lost your freedom

fighting today for a safer tomorrow

your work never in vain

God never forgets

rewards recorded, never dismissed.

Your freedom taken

four stories told

they call it military law

the deprivation of justice

no trials with evidence

justice comes only from The Most Just

God the merciful, the true rewarder of good.

The animals stole your freedom

in Hell they shall burn

with their friends the traitors

for God's law rules over military

these monsters, unjust

will be treated justly by the Almighty

smite them and torture them

they deserve it all

for imprisoning my angel

whom [uncle's name] we call.

Know, my dear uncle,

you are never forgotten

in my thoughts, dreams, and always prayers

your freedom will come

along with ours

when in heaven we are given our reunion

your wedding to the maidens of paradise

we rejoice for our beloved's eternal bliss.

Know my adored uncle

children we are to you

hero you are to us

your freedom not stolen

but sacrificed for us

your children

in Maghazi, Rafah, Ramallah, and Jenin

we are all your children

you are selfless for all of us.

Your imprisonment, like death

death for property, family, or land

God's promised reward

eternity in paradise for the most generous of souls

giving your life to Him but also to her and us

she greatly thanks you

blessed, sacred land of Palestine

the abode of our hearts

the prophets' portal to heaven

Al-Quds you are ours

and it is for you we fight.

My dear angel in captivity

we pray for your release

the animals shall be punished

with our wicked enemy

in hell they shall reside

laugh at them we will from heaven

for the pain they now suffer

as a result of the suffering they once caused

patience is your virtue

your only weapon against our enemy

fight him until the end.

Until we meet again

in the gardens of paradise

my angel in captivity

your freedom is not lost

but being reserved for later

body strong, heart stronger

with God's will we will overcome

until we meet again, my darling angel.

Map of Israel's prisons at the Rafah Crossing

Moving to Palestine

2012-01-14T17:11:00.003-06:00

I think I've become annoyingly analytical since I started law school. I've always been somewhat analytical, but now it's starting to annoy even me. Exhibit 1:

I am constantly in the process of convincing my parents to see something my way. There is always something. Last semester, I tried to convince them to let me get an apartment close to my campus so I wouldn't have to deal with hours of traffic everyday. I'm over that now, I just spend 12 hours at school everyday and that way I get all my work done and don't waste time in traffic.

My newest endeavor is convincing them to let me do my summer legal internship in Gaza. This is part of my effort to move to Palestine after I graduate law school. I decided to go to law school so that I can help my people in a greater way and in a capacity not many others can. In order to have a shot at finding the kind of job I want in Gaza when I graduate, I need to get experience and build contacts there. Then there's the small issue of my parent's permission. I was talking to my law school friend about how my parents are against me going to Gaza for the summer and her answer was, "Oh my God, you're 23 years old. Do what you want!" Then I had to explain to her the importance of my parents approval both religiously and culturally. So my next effort is convincing my parents to let me go this summer, and before I can convince them, I have to convince myself. What I mean is that I need to analyze why exactly I want to live there and have strong reasons too.

1. All-American Muslim. I don't mean that I want to be on the show or anything like that, but the show gives us a glimpse into what the future generations of Muslim-Americans can be like. Of course nurture plays as big, if not, a bigger role, as nature, but there's no denying that the longer Muslims are in the U.S., the more assimilated we become. And with every generation, more of our Islamic culture tends to fade away. It starts with language and continues.

If we look at the show, we can see that the Amens worked pretty hard to raise their kids Islamically and half of their kids are covered in tattoos and are unapologetic about it. Two of their daughters removed their hijab during adolescence. I know one of the daughters used the excuse of 9/11, but she lived in Dearborn, Michigan, where Muslims are the majority. There should have been no fear of wearing hijab there. Additionally, their only daughter who did not remove her hijab does not behave as a Muslim woman should. She sits at tables where alcohol is served, she goes to dance clubs, and she is on the verge of full on rebellion against her parents. (I know, I sound so judgmental, but I'm not trying to assess the faith and devotion of these people. Not in the slightest. I am using them as examples of where I don't want to be in one generation.)

Also, we can look at Nina. Her mom is a hajjeh (performed the Islamic pillar of pilgrimage to Mecca) and that's how she turned out. Enough said.

My brother and I call this "the skater phenomenon." It's when you become so American that your kids become skaters. I don't know why, but for us that's the epitome of over-assimilation. To him, because he's an athlete, he sees skaters as soft and weak and he wants to have big, huge, strong, warrior-type sons. For me, it's the laziness, apathy, and slovenliness of the culture. (Again, I sound so judgmental. Sorry! That's really not me.)

Looking at my family, my older brother speaks Arabic like an Arab who never left the Middle East, but his literacy is probably at a 4th grade level. My Arabic is much weaker. I speak Arabic like a kid whose parents never speak Arabic to them and who didn't spend summers abroad, and that's because I am. I mean I can converse in a very shallow way and I can deal with drivers and merchants and hang out with family, but I could never have a really meaningful conversation and I never feel like I can fully express myself. My younger brothers... oh man. They hated our last trip to Palestine because they felt like idiots and like everyone thought they were idiots because of how broken their Arabic was. My younger brother even confused what was feminine with what was masculine in the conjugation of nouns and that's something every native speaker knows. And the three of us all read at about a 2nd grade level, sadly. My point is, if I stay here, my kids won't be able to read Quran and I can't allow that to happen. If I want to prevent this fate from occurring, I need to take action now.

2. Hijrah. There are many verses in the Quran that talk about how much God loves those who make hijrah or migration for His sake. That means you move from one place where practicing Islam is not as easy, to a place where it is easier and you can raise better Muslim children and contribute more to the Islamic nation (we are, after all, one People).

I think living in Gaza will make me a better Muslim and I want to raise my non-existant kids in a conservative Islamic society. I think I can dress more modestly in Gaza and not feel like I'm less of a woman or less beautiful or like I'm not expressing myself. I know I will face a lot of different obstacles there that I don't face here when it comes to religion, like people's weird obsession with the evil eye that interferes with their belief in qadar or fate. But I think I have a strong enough religious foundation where those things won't have an impact on me. I also know gossip is a much more serious problem there, but if that is addressed early on, it won't be an issue later. If you stop a person in conversation from talking about another to you, they won't do it again or at least eventually they'll get tired of being told to shut up and they will stop. I think my prayers will play a more dominate role in my life because everything in Gaza is scheduled around the prayers and you hear the athan for each prayer and mosques are on every corner. I just really want to live in an Islamic society, and not the Amman or Dubai variety, the genuine kind.

I think living in Gaza will protect me from having the material world be the center of my existence. The Prophet taught us to live our lives on this earth like travelers; this is a temporary stay and the real life is in the hereafter. I think when you are surrounded by poverty, oppression, and war, it's easier to remember what's important in life. I think it will also create a lot of great sadaqa or charity opportunities. I can be part of the rebuilding of Gaza and I can help those who are in need when I live amongst them and I contribute to their economy and provide them services.

All in all, I want to do this for God and to strengthen my faith, first and foremost. I want to have more blessings in my life. I want to live in the land God blessed and the place where most prophets' prophethood began. The capital of the Islamic caliphate will be in Palestine and I want to be part of that and perhaps raise the soldiers who can help create that caliphate. Who knows. (Clearly, I think about my non-existant kids too much.)

3. Right of Return. How can I claim I believe in the right of return from Texas? I don't think I can. So I guess this is just as much about principle as it is about my actual wants.

The greatest goal of Israel is not to kill us all, but for the same thing that happened in '48 to happen again--that we all leave. Their goal is to make life in Palestine so unbearable for Palestinians that we decide that there are some things we won't sacrifice for our nation. Maybe one day when I have real responsibilities, I will see my parents' wisdom in leaving, but for now, I can't.

How can we defeat Israel? BDS is nice, I love BDS, but it's not as big of a blow to Zionism as Palestinians not leaving Palestine. So, in an effort to preserve my homeland and to keep it from being ethnically cleansed of my people, culture, language, religion, and history, I will return and I will be Israel's biggest fear. Not only did they expect that I'd forget about my hometown after my grandfather fled, they expected I'd forget about Palestine when my father fled, but I have done neither. I will not submit to their manipulation. I will be the Palestinian that they can't fool; the Palestinian that they can't make lose touch with the fact that they are the true enemy, not Hamas and not Fatah, but occupation. I will dedicate my life to defeating Zionism and uplifting my people. I will not stop until Jesus Christ returns or until all of the UN refugee camps in bilad al shaam (Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine) are made into orange groves or farms or amusement parks. We will all return to our hometowns and the camps we were forced to live in for four generations will be erased along with all of the sorrowful moments we spent in them. We won't need the UN or its handouts, we won't need anyone's charity or pity, we will return to our past glory for we are the children of Salah ul-Deen's army, we defeated the Crusaders and we will defeat the Zionists. And all of this starts will my internship this summer lol.

4. Living in the US is scary these days. There have been senate hearings about Muslim-Americans having to prove their patriotism. Hearings where people have said the majority of Muslims and the majority of mosques in the US support or have links to terrorism. I don't want to feel like I have to defend myself every time someone asks me about Islam and terrorism. Muslims are being imprisoned in the US for materially supporting terrorism and intending to engage in terrorism when they have done nothing at all. It's just scary. This is a battle I don't feel like fighting. I'd rather defeat Zionism. There are many smarter, more qualified, and more capable Muslim-Americans who can fight this battle; Palestine needs me more than the US.

I also think I've had enough alienation for a lifetime. I'm ready to live in a place where I don't have to say my name four times and then spell it when people ask me what it is. I'm ready to live in a place where I don't have to explain Ramadan and arranged marriages to people. I'm ready to live in a place where I don't have to search for 20 minutes to find a place to pray and then rush through my prayer in the hopes of not being "found" and disrupted. I'm ready to live in a place where I don't need to wear socks everyday so that in case I have to do wudoo (washing ritual before prayer), I won't risk being caught with my foot in the sink. I just want to be normal and blend in. I want to be noticed not for the way I'm dressed but for my ideas and my actions. I'm tired of being an outcast. I'm tired of refusing invitations to happy hours through law school and plans to "get drinks" by my peers. I want to be surrounded by people who understand and possibly share my values.

5. Give my family a tie to Palestine. After my last blood-grandparent died two years ago, my parents no longer had any desire to go to Palestine. (My grandfather's second wife is still alive, hence the term "blood-grandparents". We still consider her our grandmother, after all, she did mother half my aunts and uncles.) Anyway, I'm scared that if my parents don't have parents in Gaza, they won't travel there any more. Additionally, if my parents don't travel to Palestine, then neither will my brothers and, in the end, their children won't know Palestine. In less than one generation, my immediate family will have no connection to Palestine, just like we already have no connection to Beir el Sabaa, our hometown.

My goal is to be my immediate family's connection to Palestine, to be their reason to visit. My brothers adore me and my mother does too (not so sure about my dad), so I know they'd come visit and my niece(s) and non-existant nephews will benefit greatly from these visits. Recently, my mother told me, "there's nothing for me in Palestine." And I reminded her of her brother and his 11 children and she made the excuse that her brother was too busy with his own life to make time for her.

I will do whatever it takes to keep my family from becoming like every other Palestinian family we know in the US; we will not lose our connection to Palestine, she will always be our home. Plus, after this most recent trip, I'm the only reason my little brothers will ever go to Gaza again. I can't let them forget Palestine, I just can't.

I can't think of anything else. For now, these are the reasons I have to offer. My parents better be convinced.

Back to School

2012-01-13T13:14:00.000-06:00

I don't know what's wrong with me. I don't want to go back to school. I don't want to prepare for class. I don't want to study. I don't care about my grades or doing well. I just want to be back in Palestine.

I want to work. I want to be productive. I want to contribute to society. And I don't mean the society I live in. I think what's making me hate law school is my desire to live in Palestine. I'm also afraid I made a terrible mistake, but that's another story and is too sensitive for the internet, sorry.

Every time I return from Palestine I am depressed for over a month and it takes a lot of emotional strength and mental distractions to get out of this rut. I get back and I don't want to see or talk to my friends; I feel like none of them understand me and what I'm going through, like my time away has driven a wedge between us and made us grow apart. I don't feel like being social, I don't feel like being academic, I don't feel like searching for work for this summer in my city, I don't feel like shopping or working out or anything else I used to enjoy. I want to be in Palestine, I want to be near the sea, I want to be in an Islamic society, I want to see hijabs and beards and green and red flags. I don't want to be here.

Arab Men

2011-12-18T10:45:00.001-06:00

For the most part, I have always enjoyed being an Arab. We have delicious food, a rich culture, beautiful clothes, lively music, and a legendary history. Unfortunately, as many good things as I can list about being an Arab, I can list terrible things that frustrate me, bring me shame, and make me want to reject my culture and what it stands for. This post will focus on only one of the terrible things I hate about being an Arab: How insecure our men are.

Arab men are gorgeous. They're big and strong and have amazing deep voices and look so good doing dabkeh. But their minds are as hard as stone and their hearts frozen as ice. The very worst quality that Arab men possess is that they are insecure. The reason for this is obvious: their entire lives, their mothers have spoiled them and their fathers have treated them like heirs to a royal crown that doesn't exist. Arab men have been coddled their entire lives and they cannot stand any threat to their perceived sense of superiority. This is the reason why they refuse to work for anyone--they cannot submit to authority and lower themselves before the eyes of another man (working for a woman is unfathomable, don't even let your mind take you there).

Why does any of this matter to me? Because this nature of the Arab man is what makes him so incapable of being a quality husband. (Bear with me.) Arab men are deathly afraid of facing the reality that they are not superior to all of the rest of mankind. They refuse to marry educated women because they think these women who have been taught to think for themselves won't submit to the will of their husbands. "They will want to work and will threaten the role of provider that the husband fills in the family." This ludicrous argument is actually made by Arab men; they "want to feel needed" and that makes them feel like a true husband. Why, please answer this question, must your wife be totally helpless and dependent on you for you to feel like a man? Why can't you have confidence and self-esteem and just believe that you are a "real man" without the submission of a woman?

I think this is partly to blame on the ridiculous myth that women educate themselves only so that they can live without a husband and that education is the rejection of tradition and traditional roles. I think everyone should go to college or trade school or something because that experience helps you learn hard work and how to think critically and independently. An educated people will not be an oppressed people; the more you know, the less injustice you will be willing to endure. Who freed Egypt? They young, educated, and frustrated people. Dictators try to smother and suffocate their people to stifle their potential and keep them submissive. Arab men are dictators. If they planned to act justly to their wives, they wouldn't be so concerned with her being educated, out spoken, or protective of her rights. Instead, they would encourage this behavior because as all knowledgeable people have said from the beginning of time, women are the pillars of society; if the women are strong, then the society is strong.

Arab men need to grow up, get past their privileged childhood, and understand that the world doesn't revolve around them and they don't have free reign to treat people the way they want. Instead of fearing educated women and rejecting them from society by refusing to marry them, Arab men need to see what an asset they are to our people and encourage women to better themselves because this is how the Arab people will uplift themselves from repression, poverty, and defeatism.

The idea that women become educated so that they no longer need men is unfounded and untrue. The women I know seek educations because they want to be productive members of society, they want to contribute to the betterment of humanity, and they want to take advantage of the skills, talents, and privileges God gave them. This type of ambition is rewarded in advanced societies, but our male-worshiping society would prefer to remain in the dark ages by rejecting these goal-oriented women in order to feed the ego of our spoiled and insecure men.

Gaza's Children: Playing without Toys

2011-12-15T14:07:00.001-06:00

It is widely known that as part of Israel's illegal siege of Gaza, one of the arbitrarily banned items prevented from entering the small coastal enclave is children's toys. In a place marked by an unbelievably high rate of unemployment and excruciating poverty, it is not unlikely that even if toys were permitted to enter, most of these children's families would not be able to afford them.

A word commonly used to describe the Palestinian people is "resiliency," and the children of Palestine exhibit this quality as brilliantly as their parents. One manner in which this quality makes itself evident is in the unique and often toyless way they engage in "play." Of the children lucky enough to have toys, oftentimes these toys are smuggled in through the tunnels, are brought to them in the suitcases of their relatives who have traveled abroad, or are the rusty hand-me-downs of their older siblings. No matter what tools they use to assist in their playing, Gaza's children, like the rest of the world's children, receive much of their joy from the simple act of playing. Here is a look into Gaza's children at play:

Being the most popular sport in the world, it is unsurprising that Gaza's children take great pleasure in the game of soccer. Here, young boys from Maghazi refugee camp prepare to play in the narrow road in front of their home.

Boys in Der el Balah refugee camp play soccer in an a small empty plot of land between a few houses at sunset.

Teenage boys in Khan Yunis play soccer in the courtyard of a boys junior high after the end of the school day.

A young boy in Khan Yunis' Asdaa Amusement Park (built in place of an abandoned Israeli settlement) enjoys a spinning swing ride.

Children in Maghazi refugee camp take advantage of a long unpaved road in order to play marbles.

Two Maghazi brothers toss their marbles into square-shaped holes they dug into the ground.

A young boy from Jabalia refugee camp rides his bike that boasts the Palestinian flag boldly on its front basket. Other children climb a pile of sand behind him as they make their way to school for the afternoon shift. Most schools in the Gaza Strip run two shifts, a damaging remedy to the growing classroom shortage crisis.

A kindergartener from Deir el Balah refugee camp proudly shows off the remote controlled car his father gifted him with for Eid ul-Adha upon his return from the Hajj pilgrimage in Mecca, Saudi Arabia.

When fisherman are only permitted to go three nautical miles into the sea, are still under risk of being attacked, and their damaged boats are nearly impossible to repair due to high cost or limited materials, sometimes the best use for a boat is the one shown here. Young boys play on a marooned boat on the Gaza City shore of the Mediterranean.

Schoolgirls from Maghazi refugee camp write and draw with chalk on a metal door.

A pre-K student from the Zeitoon neighborhood of Gaza City uses his creativity and a couple of mandarins to entertain himself and those around him. When toys are not easy to come by, children in Gaza can find joy in the most mundane objects.

A thirteen year old girl from Maghazi refugee camp writes her name in the sand of the Khan Yunis beach during an evening out with her family. Because of widespread poverty and no freedom of movement, the beach is a favorite source of entertainment to Gazans of all ages and incomes, both for its affordability and availability.

A pre-K student plays in the sand of the Khan Yunis beach at sunset.

Siblings play with glass bottles in the pile of sand in front of their Maghazi home.

A young boy from Nuseirat refugee camp assists in the baking of saaj, traditional Palestinian bread, by using a plank of wood to shift the burning coals and leaves heating the dome that bakes the bread. Sometimes play is disguised.

On Gaza's eastern border with Israel, these children from Maghazi refugee camp run around and play in the rusty remains of what was once a working truck. Since their home is very near to the buffer zone, these children play within the sight of nearby Israeli soldiers whose security towers are visible on the horizon, only a few hundred meters away.

Two young boys play with the waste dumped by their neighbors into a nearby empty plot of land surrounded by houses and offices in al-Rimal district of Gaza City.

In the Zahra district of Gaza City, young children engage in a practice common in the Gaza Strip, the burning of refuse. Sometimes when children are left to their creativity, what results is not always safe.

A very young child in Jabalia refugee camp kneels under a mule holding a knife to its hoof. Often when children play, they emulate the actions of adults and this little boy seems to have spent significant amounts of time with with a farrier.

In the presence of beloved companions, a child needs no toys in order to have fun, as shown by these cousins from Maghazi refugee camp.

Back to Earth

2011-12-15T13:36:00.002-06:00

It's been so long since I have posted anything. Yesterday was my last final and the end of my first semester in law school. I just submitted writing samples, my resume, a cover letter and all of my hopes and dreams to UNRWA hoping for a legal internship this summer. I genuinely have all of my eggs in one basket. They are the only people I want to work for and the only people I want to interview with and their Gaza headquarters are the only offices I want to step into. SPEAKING OF GAZA, I'M GOING!!!!

I'm going to submit the failed Electronic Intifada article from this summer that I promised to post four months ago, it's about Gaza's kids. They're too cute!! Anyway, I'll try to keep this thing updated while I'm in Gaza and hopefully as my career and education progress.

p.s. This semester was the worst thing of my life. I've lost 15 pounds from forgetting/not having time to eat. I haven't seen any of my friends in months and I miss the mosque. I hope I can balance things better next semester!

First Two Weeks of Law School

2011-09-04T22:25:00.001-05:00

Ok, this is going to be super lame but bear with me.

***

First, I will complain about my law school.

It began at orientation. They brought three alums to speak to us, and of all the people who have ever graduated from this prestigious institute of high education, they picked two billionaires and a former advisor to jackass Bush Jr. One of the billionaires graduated at the bottom of his law school class, never studied, and couldn't find a job out of law school because he had such a terrible resume. He took whatever cases he could get his hands on until he discovered his business savviness and then he ended his legal career and focussed on becoming as rich as possible. The other billionaire is being sued by the federal government for an antitrust merger he is facilitating. I really don't know what there is to be so proud of when it comes to either of the old rich white men, and I really don't feel a need to describe why I was not impressed that the one woman they brought in who served as general counsel for moron Bush during his presidency.

Why does my school only produce rich Republicans? Why did I hear the fact that they produce more fortune 500 tycoons and Forbes listers than any other institution in the U.S. after the Harvard business school? That doesn't make the world a better place. That doesn't bring justice to the oppressed. That doesn't remove dictators from power. That doesn't influence international policy. Am I really the only law student who decided to go to law school for those reasons?

After meeting my classmates, I'm convinced I might be. Don't get me wrong, they're all very nice to me and love asking me questions about hijab and fasting and prayer and all of the other "foreign" things about me, but I know that novelties fade and I won't fascinate them for much longer and my political views will come out and they'll despise me. I love talking about myself (explains why I created a blog), so i don't mind their interest, but what bothers me is that these are the future leaders of our state and they're all so shallow and superficial and exactly the same: politically conservative, sexually promiscuous, homophobic rich kids in massive amounts of debt still living like rich kids. I guess to each their own, but I generally despise contradiction and these people are all walking talking contradictions.

Oh! Let me now complain about the supreme court justice they brought to speak to us last week. Let me start by saying that I was very excited to meet one of the most powerful women in American history and I really applaud some of the incredible things she did in her life like balance law school and law review with caring for her young child and her terminally ill husband, then supporting the family while he went through chemo, then the incredible work she did for women's rights. She really is great. BUT THEN HER TRUE COLORS CAME OUT. She decided to talk about how the U.S. judiciary doesn't borrow much from foreign law, even though they take a lot from us. Then she mentioned how we share a lot of views with other judiciaries around the world and unsurprisingly she briefly mentioned something a Canadian judge once said and then she decided to thoroughly piss me off. She quoted an Israeli judge. First of all, I hate when people pretend that Israel is so similar to us. They don't have a constitution, so they don't have any way of checking the laws the Knesset comes up with, the don't have our system of checks and balances, and they're a militaristic bloodthirsty war mongering nation. What was worse what the quote she spewed out:

THE POLICE THINK a suspect they apprehended knows where and when a bomb is going to go off. Can the police use torture to extract that information? In an eloquent decision by Aharon Barak, then Chief Justice of Israel, the court said, 'Torture? Never!' The message of the decision was that we could hand our enemies no greater victory than to come to look like that enemy in our disregard for human dignity.

WHAT THE FU**?! If you are trying to claim that Israel doesn't use torture to get information out of or simply humiliate and traumatize Palestinians they capture, then you are living on another planet. I can recite the names of ten people with whom I share blood relations who have been victims of Israel's torture tactics in Israeli prisons. I don't want to hear any of this nonsense that Israel is liberal democratic country that shares our values. The coolest thing about law school so far has turned into a major disappointment.

***

Ok, now I will complain about my Arab life.

This weekend three girls I know got engaged and two more who are a couple of years younger than me (shriek!) got married. These are girls from my community, girls from my masjid, girls I grew up with. I don't know why this is getting to me but maybe I'm looking for an escape from law school or the stress of studying, but all of these new relationships are making me feel like an epic failure. These girls aren't that much prettier than me, or nicer than me, or funnier than me, or smarter than me, or come from better families than mine.. they're all pretty thin though lol, but my point is I'm feeling like I'm doing something terribly wrong. Like somehow these girls have some talent that I lack at mesmerizing men and getting them to put out large amounts of money to marry them. WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME?

Ok, I'm not really freaking out as badly as this probably makes it appear, but seriously what's going on? Most of my really close life long friends are married. Most of my college friends are single and I can still think of a handful of girls around my age from my masjid who are also single, and I swear each one of them is an incredible catch (most more incredible than the recent brides) but I'm really confused why we're all still single. This is the kind of thing that really makes me wonder what goes through men's heads.. can they really see things that differently from me? Probably.

As some of my previous posts kind of reveal, I has a crazy potential-sutior related summer and it really sucked because I was so confused and scared and stressed out and I'm a lot more emotionally stable now that I don't have to deal with those decisions, but for some reason now I can't stop thinking about the subject. Actually, I know why. I think I know exactly why. By the way, Arab girls, don't EVER under ANY circumstance tell your mom about the Arab boy in the community you have a serious crush on. First off, it'll freak her out and she'll think your dating him behind her back. Second of all, it'll make her feel helpless and weak and like she has the most strong willed daughter in the world. Third of all, it'll convince you that you have a shot with him even though deep down you know your family will never take a single step to make this wish of yours reality. In summary, keep your secret crushes a secret. I think my non-secret crush is what's making me marriage obsessed these days. Oh man, you don't want to get me started on how stupid this boy is. I will save the details of this for another post because it's a pretty long and convoluted story and I don't want to wish evil upon this stupid boy tonight.

***

Now I will complain about my social life.

During Ramadan I shut myself off from facebook so I could make better use of my time. (BTW, yay for Libya and the Ramadan Liberation that came their way! I can't believe I didn't blog about that, but wow! what a great night that was!) Well, the hiatus from facebook did other great things for me too, it shut me out from my social circle so that I didn't feel like I was missing out on any fun outings or gatherings or get togethers while I was studying. Now that I'm back on facebook, I'm really considering deactivating. I don't what to know what's going on with my friends or be included in their fun because right now, law school is more important. I was able to balance my social life with school as an undergrad, but that's not going to be as easy now and I don't think I should try. How do I show my friends that I love them but want nothing to do with them for the next four months? I feel so mean, I don't know how to do it.

Ok, I need to go brief some cases. Good night!
P.S. I HATE CONTRACT LAW!!!!!!!!

Six Days

2011-08-13T18:07:00.001-05:00

I have six days left until my three years of hell begin.

I'm so scared. I really can't find a way to fully describe it. I'm always terrified of starting something new (that's probably why I'm not married) and law school is no exception. Here's a list of some of the things I'm scared of:

-failing
-getting too stressed out
-hating everything about it
-the terrible drive
-the snobby rich white kids
-not knowing how well/terrible I'm doing until two months after the semester is over, when grades come in
-always feeling inadequate
-never being caught up
-socratic method
-realizing law school's not for me
-finding out my passion lies elsewhere
-I'll never have babies (I'm going through a really weird baby crazy phase)
-learning how to write/read/think in a totally different way
-not finding people in my section that I like
-being a crappy outline creator
-not having the discipline I need to succeed
-realizing that I'm not as smart as I thought I was

God. Why am I such a wimp? I am a Palestinian woman. We are the children of struggle and heartache. We are the mothers of warriors and heroes. We are the people God blessed with the holy land. I can handle this. My grandmother was a Bedouin. She had rough hands and a strong back. She birthed mighty men and strong willed women. Law school is nothing. I got this. These frat boys don't have anything on me.

I will not be beat by these six classes.

Brother's Theory of "Group-Hate"

2011-08-13T01:58:00.002-05:00

I always thought that being a Muslim in the U.S. was much more difficult for women than men and a short conversation with my white-washed brothers made me certain I was right.

Let me explain very quickly that 9/11 changed the course of my life and is a major motivator behind my decision to go to law school and general life plans. I hate Islamophobia with a passion and it has made the idea of bringing up my future children abroad a serious consideration in my mind. I read about Guantanamo Bay prisoners, know about Imams from all over Texas and the rest of the U.S. who have been imprisoned for months without being charged, I know about Muslim charities being shut down and Muslim organizations being slandered, and I know about hate-crimes that have taken the lives of countless Muslims, Arabs, Hindus, and Sikhs. Islamophobia is real and it's a serious issue that our nation must address. I believe in this so strongly that I have decided to dedicate much of my energy and life's work to resolving this growing epidemic.

On multiple occasions, I have had conversations with my brothers about Islamophobia and the threat it poses to the civil liberties of Muslim-Americans. I believe that it is both present within American society and that is is institutionalized, particularly when it comes to the government and all issues vaguely relating to "security." My brothers never comment on if the government is afraid of and discriminatory towards Muslims, rather they prefer to argue on behalf of the American people. There's nothing wrong with that. I mean, I grew up between Americans and, usually, I even consider myself one. A lot of Americans are kind and tolerant and welcoming, I sincerely believe that. But I am also sure that a great number of Americans hate and fear anything that remotely seems Muslim, Arab, or Middle Eastern. My brothers disagree.

They both live on their college campuses a few hours from home and they play college sports. Thus they are isolated from the family and friends they grew up surrounded by and are forced to develop new networks of people to rely on. They are integral parts of their teams and through this camaraderie have developed deep bonds with their teammates. They compare being part of a team to being a member of a family. I think this immersion in an all-American "family" has led them to the belief all people are open-minded enough to look at you as a valued human being regardless of your race, ethnicity, gender, or religion. Sadly, they are wrong. They refuse to believe that they may have friends or teammates who, although they'd never show it or outright say it, like them IN SPITE of their creed.

My youngest brother, the football player, developed a theory to explain to me how hate really works. Let me preface this by explaining that he is one of the least politically correct people I have ever met, is incredibly immature and simplistic, and often words things in the worst possible way. He begins by explaining his theory through a personal confession:

Do you hate Jews? [Me: No.] Well, I do. But if I met a Jew and I talked to them, I wouldn't hate them. That's how hate works, it can only be aimed at groups, not at individuals. A person can hate Muslims in general, but they won't hate the Muslims they meet. I bet you I could get any Muslim-hater to like me. I'm so awesome, how could they not like me?

That's his theory, that being awesome can overcome hate and that when people claim they hate Muslims, they are only paying xenophobia a lip service. It's cute how naive he is. Maybe he realized that his stupid and illogical anti-Semitism was not rooted in anything and was insincere and figured that all other prejudiced people were like him? Whatever it was that motivated him, his theory is wrong. I found proof of this after speaking to two blonde, Texan, non-hijab wearing, female reverts.

These two beautiful ladies both found Islam in a similar and unsurprising way, they dated Muslim boys and learned about the religion that made more sense to them than the dogmas they had been taught growing up in Southern Baptist churches. They explained to me how they often feel like spies amongst the non-Muslim population. Co-workers, acquaintances, and relatives will speak openly about their hate for Muslims, Arabs, and South Asians, mention how they distrust them, make snide and degrading remarks about the Islamic faith, and make distasteful jokes about bombings, explosions, or detonators. I thought about how I never knew what people I met really thought of Muslims because they automatically knew I was part of the group in question (I wear hijab), but these girls blended in so well that they were able to find out this uncomfortable truth.

Since both girls work together in retail, they told me countless stories about how their co-workers treat customers, how their boyfriends' parents are spoken to and taunted in public, and how insensitive their peers remain after they explain that they too are Muslims and don't appreciate being disrespected. It was shocking and disappointing. I explained to these girls how my brothers, one of whom has the most terroristic name imaginable, are convinced that Islamophobia doesn't exist and both girls blew up in disbelief. They had seen and been victims of such blatant hate, they couldn't imagine anyone discrediting the existence of the particular type of prejudice they faced.

Even in ways I didn't imagine, I was right: being a female Muslim in the U.S. is more difficult than being a Muslim male.

Ramadan Justice

2011-08-04T03:32:00.001-05:00

Ramadan is always my favorite time of the year, to the point that I feel the need to sing. In addition to the multiple Arabic songs I learned as I child, I also sing Christmas carols with altered Islamic verses that I make up on the spot. One of my most popular creations includes the following verses: "it's the most wonderful time of the year, children are fasting, and women are reciting, and men are donating, it's the most wonderful time of the year." Ok, I'm not that creative on the spot, but that's how it continues to flow out of my wind pipes, year after year.

This Ramadan, I wasn't in as exuberant of a mood as all past Ramadans. Even my LSAT-study Ramadan was more exciting than this Ramadan. The day before Ramadan we read headlines and saw news alerts and facebook statuses and heard sound bites on NPR that over 100 people had been massacred in Hama, Syria by the Assad regime. In the five months of protests, this day was the bloodiest with over 150 being killed throughout the nation. How can we rejoice the beginning of this "most wonderful time of the year" when our Muslim brothers and sisters are being slaughtered in the streets of their hometowns by their tyrannical and murderous president?

If mass murder in Syria wasn't enough, there was also the chaos within the rebel forces in Libya as one of their military commanders was mysteriously found dead and his corpse burned and dumped. The slain leader's tribe is making threats to the rebel forces accusing them of dragging their feet and not exerting all of their effort in investigating their tribe member's murder. How can I sing my made up Ramadan song when there are dangerous divisions among the freedom fighters in Libya?

Even worse than political struggle, there is the famine in the Horn of Africa that has already claimed so many lives and with so many people unreachable and such limited aid supplies, NGOs and charities are certain more preventable deaths will occur. I see images of starving children, read articles about the overcrowded camps and displaced people, and watch videos of women sharing the suffering they endured as they trekked countless miles, leaving their weak and malnourished dying children behind as they struggled to save the rest of their children. I cannot imagine the pain they feel, not even 16 hour fasts can offer a glimpse because we all know that at the end of our fast waits an extravagant meal. When someone in my family wants to throw away some of the food left on their plate because, after eating two-times more than their stomach can hold, they're too full to finish, I feel shame and disgrace. How can I enjoy the ample food before me when I know helpless people a world away are literally starving to death?

Thank goodness this is a time when we work tirelessly in increasing our faith and spend several hours every night in prayer. This is a time when God answers our prayers, the gates of paradise are open, and God sheds His mercy upon His servants. We can pray for these people and the angels with pray with us and recite "Amen" at the end of each of our prayers. This gives us some peace of mind and we know that just as our imam is reciting prayers for these oppressed and suffering people, others all over the state and the country and world are making the same prayers and that surely God will hear from at least some of us during this blessed month. These prayers also remind the oblivious Muslims at the night prayers of all of the people in need of our help and our prayers and our donations. In Ramadan, the Prophet Mohammad (SAW) was his most generous, tells us one of his wives in an authentic hadith, and Muslims all over the world reflect this generosity throughout Ramadan as well. These communal prayers remind us of those in desperate need of our generosity and I hope they encourage people to be more giving.

Then three days into Ramadan, there was a little distraction from all of the misery in Africa and the Middle East. No, I'm not referring to the raising of the debt ceiling (which was long overdue) or to the depressing announcement that American soldiers will spend an extra year in Iraq at the request of the Iraqi "government." I'm referring to the beautiful display of justice and accountability and God's balance on this earth that took place in Egypt early this morning, local time.

I woke up at 5:00 AM to eat suhour when I found my dad asleep on the couch. I woke him with the question, "why are you still awake?" I know, he wasn't but it was very early and that was the most sense I could make at that hour. He looked just as confused as I was and explained to me that Hosni Mubarak's trial was beginning in Cairo as the pointed at the TV with the remote in his hand.

As I ate my oatmeal, I listened to the lawyers prosecuting Mubarak on behalf of their martyred/murdered clients and the Egyptian nation in general and I beamed with pride. This right here was the Arab dignity and honor I had grown up hearing about. These are the people who were enlightened by knowledge and innovation while Western Europeans ate unsalted food with wooden teeth after a long day working as serfs for the illiterate buffoon who owned the land they farmed. Mubarak, his sons, the minister of interior, and big businessmen were being tried for murder, conspiracy to murder, profiteering, corruption, and the shameful act of selling oil to Israel. Wait. What? Mubarak and co. were being tried in criminal court for selling oil to Israel? Apparently this was a dishonor to and betrayal of the Egyptian people and what they stand for. My eyes filled with tears.

Not only was this trial being held to hold this dictator accountable for the crimes he committed while in office and to bring justice to those who were killed or injured by his security forces during the revolution, but it was also legitimizing the Palestinian struggle. Finally it felt like we had a friend, an ally, a nation that felt our pain and decided to no longer be an accessory to our suffering. Our struggle was being legitimized as Israel' pariah status was solidified. The 'sanctions' part of BDS might finally come to fruition.

Even though this Ramadan began with a massacre and a famine, God has already shown us His immense mercy and generosity by allowing a second pharaoh to meet his deserved demise. We have now witnessed "Ramadan justice" in Egypt and we pray for "Ramadan freedom" in Libya, Syria, and Yemen and for "Ramadan rain and prosperity" in the Horn of Africa.

Side note: Seeing Mubarak in a hospital bed and his son holding a Quran did not garner any sympathy on my part for them. It just made me think of pharaoh trying to claim belief as he was drowning in the Red Sea after Moses and the Israelites escaped his army. All I wanted to do was go shove dirt down their throats like archangel Gabriel did to pharaoh as he drowned. They cannot make up for all of the crimes they committed when they were in power now that they see their demise before them. It's too little, too late. Poor health and old age are no excuse and a false portrayal of piety won't save you. No one can escape "Ramadan justice."

Ramadan Resolutions

2011-07-31T04:05:00.001-05:00

I believe in the constant progression of humankind. I think that if we respect out parents and the hard work they put into raising us, then we should do everything in our power to out do everything they did so that their efforts are not in vain. That means be more educated, more successful, recycle, give more charity, be more religious, be more patriotic, and every other positive quality that exists.

Obviously if I think we as humans should improve from one generation to the next, I also think we should personally improve as time passes. I think that if you can look back one year in the past and not think of way in which you have improved yourself, then you have wasted a year. For me, Ramadan is the time every year when I look deep into myself, assess if I have done enough to better myself, and come up with ways to improve.

Since last year, I have consciously made the effort to dress more modestly and pray more sunnah prayers. I've been pretty good about both this year, but I still have plenty of room for improvement.

I have been listening to a series of lectures for the past ten days called Ramadan Prep, a ten day series that offers advice on how to get the most out of this Ramadan, and almost everyone of the ten lectures has mentioned making a detailed list of goals and working to change yourself permanently, not just for the 29 or 30 days of Ramadan. That's my plan and below are my goals:

Read the Quran in its entirety TWICE every month, beginning with this Ramadan and continuing throughout the year.

Being more attentive when reading Quran so that I benefit from what I read and reflect on it.

Spend meaningful time with my parents on a daily basis.

Make sure that I talk to each of my brothers at least once a week. (None of them live at home during the year.)

Make more frequent and more sincere do'aa.

Pray qiyaam regularly.

Make better use of the time I spend in the car.

Memorize something from the Quran every week, even if it's one ayah.

Refrain from gossiping, cursing, getting on facebook, watching TV and Netflix, and talking on the phone excessively.

Be more patient and never patronize others or put them down.

Give sadaqa regularly.

Have more concentration during prayer.

Always remember that my highest goals are in the afterlife and never lose sight of how temporary this life is by constantly remembering death.

Pray each of the sunnah prayers and dress modestly (stolen from last year).

And for the love of God, convince my uterus to only go through one menses this Ramadan! I refuse to miss ten days this Ramadan and demand that I be able to pray each of the last ten nights! (Sorry if this is TMI, but I'm still angry about last year when I missed out on qiyaam on the 29th night of Ramadan. I threw a fit like a child and cried most of that day. Don't laugh, I was a big mess. Now I just blame it on hormones lol.)

Blessed Ramadan for all of you and your families! In Shaa Allah we all accomplish our Ramadan resolutions and we emerge from this holy month changed and improved people.

Joe Biden

2011-07-28T21:55:00.001-05:00

I have the funniest mom in the world. She's also brilliant. BUT she is oblivious when it comes to current events and politics.

As Ramadan approches, we begin to make and freeze unearthly amounts of food for the coming month. Today was dedicated to making fatayir, or little spinach and cheese pies. Let me tell you a little about the conversation I had with my mother as we cut dough and filled it with a number of savory stuffings.

Me: When is Im Khalid coming back from Amman?
Mama: The therriest.
Me: Huh?
Mama: The therriest.
Me: The thirtieth of July?
Mama: Yes, the therriest.
Me: Mama, I'm telling you there is no "therriest," just the thirtieth.
Mama: Joe Biden.

Then we both laughed for the next fifteen minutes. Allow me to explain why the vice president was the punchline of our joke.

A few weeks ago I was talking to two of my Arab-American friends and they told me about a girl they knew. She was a childhood friend of theirs but she was incredibly sheltered growing up. The example they gave to show me how out-of-touch she was, as a result of her over-protection during childhood and adolescence, was that she didn't know who the current vice president was. I was horrified. This was a girl who was born and raised in America and a legal adult who didn't know who would lead her country if something happened to the president.

After this conversation with my friends, I began to wonder if my oblivious mother was as out-of-touch as this girl I was told about. So I asked her.

Me: Mama, who is the vice president?
Mama: Of America?
Me: Yes.
Mama: I don't know.
Me: Come on Mama! You've lived her for almost thirty years! Even if you can't vote yet, you should know stuff like this.
Mama: My citizenship test isn't for a while. When I need to study for it, I will, and then I will know all of these things. It's not important now.
Me: Mama, it IS important! You live in this country and you should know the basic things about it.
Mama: How many idiots in America know who the vice president is? Most of them. But how many have the entire Qur'an memorized? Not many! I'm smarter than most Americans so leave me alone!
Me: *Speechless because my mother is right* Joe Biden, mama. Please remember that.

A few days later, this issue comes up again.

Me: Mama, who is the vice president?
Mama: *Pause then laughter*
Me: Mama!! You have no excuse this time! I told you the other day!
Mama: Clinton? His wife, I mean?
Me: *Pause* Umm, Clinton who? What's her first name?
Mama: Uhhh.. Ca--... Ha--... HILARY!
Me: Good job, Mama! That is her name! And pretty good, she's the secretary of state so she's still pretty important, but not vice president. Who is the vice president?
Mama: McCain?
Me: Wow. Ok, well, he ran for president in 2008, so that's not too bad, but who is the vice president?
Mama: John...?
Me: Mama, that's McCain's first name, but keep trying. You're almost there.
Mama: Ja--... Jack... JACK TRIPPER!! ... Hold on.
Me: *Laughter* Oh my God, Mama!!! Joe Biden!!! What's wrong with you!?

That was about three days ago. Today, when I tried to correct her pronunciation of "thirtieth," to prove to me she wasn't an idiot, she said the name of the vice president. Clever and well-timed, I know. My mom is the funniest mom in the world and absolutely brilliant.

My gorgeous, funny, and brilliant mom, circa 1979. Gaza, Palestine.

Warrior for President

2011-07-28T03:41:00.001-05:00

I always zone out when I drive and think about the most random of things. Today as I drove, I reflected on something I read in Dr. Mazin Qumsiyeh's "Popular Resistance in Palestine: A History of Hope and Empowerment":

To those who believe in it, popular resistance is superior on both moral and utilitarian grounds. We believe violence is not easily defensible on utilitarian grounds because it breeds more violence and is usually counterproductive... But also in terms of morality, violence creates the kind of society that we all think of as amoral.

What I thought of was less connected to Palestine than you might assume. I thought about how very frequently humanity fails at choosing proper leaders. This post, inspired by Dr. Qumsiyeh's eloquent point on the damage violence has beyond the particular situation in which it is perpetrated and his general condemnation of violence, will be dedicated to this issue.

In the past two American presidential elections (2008 and 2004), both of the candidates whose campaigns failed to win them the office they coveted based their campaigns on the same factor: military past. John Kerry was a Democrat and John McCain was a Republican and both tried to use their military pasts to prove to the American people that they were qualified to be the president. All of Egypt's post-monarchy dictators had strong military backgrounds, and that was precisely how they were able to gain political power. For centuries, Turkey's military has had incredible influence on it's policies and many of its officials came from the military. Pakistan survived under military rule for many years. Saddam Hussein and Muammar Qaddafi were/are military men. The Taliban militants have pretty much run Afghanistan for decades now. Every single Israeli PM, president, and minister has military service in their past and it shapes all of their policies. The list goes on forever, but the point I'm trying to make is that, at least in modern history, militaries have played major roles in shaping the policy agendas of many countries in the world.

My issue with this is that the qualities that make a great warrior are exactly the opposite of the qualities that make a good diplomat. Warriors have to act quickly and in a way that best guarantees their safety and the safety of others in their platoon (or whatever the appropriate term is), but diplomats have to make long drawn out decisions that shape the futures of people all over the world, not just those who have elected/appointed them, thus acting simply in their own narrow self interests or the interests of only their nation, they are oppressing billions and creating an unsustainable future. Warriors must have uncompromising conviction in order to have the courage to risk their lives for their nation, but diplomats must be able to, well, engage in diplomacy which is defined by compromise and having the ability to see issues from multiple perspectives in order to instate just and enduring policies. To me, it seems like the better of a warrior a man is, the poorer of a diplomat he is guaranteed to be. Why, then, do so many nations choose to have their top diplomatic offices filled by warriors?

Going back to a point that Dr. Qumsiyeh made, violence is not healthy. Someone who has taken human lives has had some traumatic life experiences and maybe shouldn't be given the power to kill millions more with impunity or the potential to do with a nation what he pleases. Militaries are vital parts of nations, and I am not suggesting we eliminating them. What I am suggesting is that soldiers be treated for PTSD and that people understand that certain acts can never be undone and change us in a way that cannot be reversed. Once you are able to look past the common humanity between you and your enemy, ignore that they have families to support and loved ones who will mourn them for eternity, and point your weapon at them and end their life, you should never be put in a position where that can happen again (i.e. be given the highest amount of power possible for one individual) because you can no longer fully understand the incredible value of human life. This may sound mean, but soldiers are psychologically damaged goods and diplomats/national leaders should value all human life and be free of psychological damage.

In the U.S., the president also has the role of commander and chief. WHY?? Why would you want the same person who serves as your chief diplomat to also determine what your soldiers should be doing on the ground? I firmly believe one person cannot be good at both; the qualities that ensure success in one are mutually exclusive with the qualities that ensure success in the other. I just don't understand why humans keep choosing warriors to lead them when it only leads to terrible fates; revolutions in Egypt and Libya, genocide then occupation in Iraq, the fall of the Ottoman empire, lack of stability and violence in Afghanistan, dysfunctional government in Pakistan, war-mongering and decrepit economy in the U.S. (not to mention a debt crisis ceiling crisis created by uncompromising politicians), and politicians advocating ethnic cleansing in Israel. Why can't we learn from all of these unforgivable mistakes?

Electronic Intifada

2011-07-27T00:37:00.001-05:00

In the two months since I have created this blog, I have received a little over 90 views. I'm not sure what I can do to attract more readers, especially if I plan on remaining anonymous. This helped me decide that if it was a wide audience I craved, I could fulfill that desire by submitting something to Electronic Intifada without compromising the anonymity of this blog.

Yesterday I did just that. In case they don't want to publish my piece, I'll just post it here instead. I'm also working on another piece that I'm very excited about focussing on Gaza's children. I don't want to give too much away unless there's a chance it gets published, so keep your eye out!

Also, without being too cliche or annoying, if you like what you read on here, please share it with someone. I'd like to reach an audience of people who find my writing entertaining and informative, and I also really like getting feedback. Most of the time, I write about things that I can't stop thinking about because they're either fascinating, strange, or depressing and I feel like over-analyzing them or sharing them with others will make them easier to deal with. I've pretty much talked all of my friends' ears off and my facebook community simultaneously doesn't seem to care and reads controversy into everything.

Thanks! Pray that I get published!!

Growing Disillusioned

2011-07-25T02:07:00.000-05:00

Because of how spread out my extended family is, I don't have a lot of relatives that I know very well. I know all of their names and faces and basic biographical information, but I think relatives should have deeper and more sophisticated knowledge and understanding of one another.

Before meeting most of my relatives in 2004, I only knew two of my uncles. One lived four hours away from us for the majority of my life and we saw him pretty regularly, about twice every year. The other uncle lived in New Mexico and we didn't see him very often until he got laid off from his job as a professor at a university. Then he moved to Texas to look for work and lived with us for six months.

I was a young child, but I loved my uncle deeply and grew very attached to him. He was very generous and his Eidiyyeh (Eid gift of money) was always double what my dad gave me. He used to take my younger brothers and I along on his daily jogs at a nearby park and on the way there and back he'd quiz us on the capitals of the American states. I remember one time we were on our way to the park when my uncle asked us the capital of Louisiana, and at that exact moment, my younger brother fell and scraped his elbow pretty badly. We all immediately asked if he was ok and if we should take him home and if it hurt, and he looked up at us and said "Baton Rouge." We all laughed so hard! Till this day, when any of us mentions Baton Rouge, we remember that story and laugh about how dedicated to our little game my brother was.

Eventually my uncle decided that he was tired of looking for work in the U.S. and tired of hearing that he was "overqualified" for everything he applied for. Now it was time for "Plan B." My uncle broke the news to us that he was going to return to Gaza, take care of his elderly mother, get married, and finally begin his life. I was so sad. My cousins in Gaza already had plenty of uncles to spend time with, all I had was this uncle! They didn't need him, but I did. I remember he told us that he wouldn't be able to spoil us or give us special treatment anymore since he was moving to Gaza. I was so confused. Although in retrospect, I now think he may have been kidding, but at the time I thought he was serious. He said that in Gaza he has nearly fifty nieces and nephews and he has to treat us all the same. No more huge Eidiyyeh or extra attention, we'd be four out of fifty-four and there wasn't enough of him to go around. Not only did those kids on the other side of the world steal my uncle, they made him mean too.

That was about fifteen years ago. When I was in Gaza earlier this year, I spent a lot of time with this uncle of mine and even though he missed most of my formidable years, it was like we were never apart. He understood me better than any of my aunts and uncles and possibly even better than my own father, his brother. At one point during my trip, his six kids convinced me to spend the night at their house and I told them I'd only stay if they had an extra, brand-new toothbrush for me. They did. To the great joy of my my six cousins under 11, I was spending the night, but little did they know that I'd spend none of my evening with them. My uncle and I caught up on everything he had missed in my life until the late hours of the night; I told him about my life goals, career aspirations, priorities, and everything else I could think of. That night, he told me something brilliant. He said, "you can't come to Gaza and not leave changed."

I thought about that a lot. I remember after returning to the U.S. in 2004 after my three month family reunion in Gaza, I was a completely different kid. I remember my friends complaining that I had changed and my response was always that I had simply grown up. I saw my life through a different lens now that I had witnessed real poverty and suffering. My most recent trip had the same effect on me.

I felt like I had a new purpose in life, and I saw that in spite of all of the "activism" I was part of in the U.S., there's no resistance like the resistance of the people actually living in Palestine. Every breath they take is a bigger blow to the Zionists than any rally I participate in or campus discussion I organize. By simply going about their daily lives, they are winning a war and proving that the 19th century founding Zionists completely misread the indigenous people of Palestine. My goal before then had been to use whatever talents I had to benefit the Muslim-American community to which I belonged. After Gaza, I felt like my homeland needed me more. America was full of Muslims who were smarter, harder working, and more dedicated and passionate than me. Palestine has bigger problems, less resources, and far less human capital. Whatever I had to offer, it was more needed in Palestine and could make a bigger difference in Palestine. I decided that I wanted to dedicate my life to my homeland and my struggling compatriots.

That was six months ago. It took me until last week to realize that I had been away from Gaza for that long already. I left Gaza on January 22nd, 2011 and today is July 25th. It's strange; as soon as we crossed through Rafah on our way to Cairo, I felt like my two months in Gaza were a dream. I was still in shock that I was given the opportunity to go to Gaza that even as I was leaving, I couldn't believe my incredible luck. Now that it has been six months, that dream has grown even more hazy and now I fear that soon I'll be so disillusioned that it'll be like I never even went. When I started this blog two months ago, I expected that most of it would be me telling stories about my trip to Gaza. Now, I struggle to remember any stories worth telling.

The details of events are growing more difficult to remember and I can't even remember the name of one of my 80 cousins. He has nine brothers and sisters and he's one of the youngest three, I can't even picture his face. What has happened to me? The other day someone asked me what the old Palestinian currency was before the occupation and I was like the Palestinian pound, a jney. This person asked if I was sure that it wasn't a lira and I confidently answered, "no, it was a jney." I was so wrong. It was a lira. How do I not know that? Everyone I encountered in Gaza said the price of things in the old extinct lira first and then the shekel, how can I forget something this basic? That's just the little stuff, imagine how little I think about Gaza if these things are already fading from my memory. It's a scary thought and I hope that I am able to hold on to as much of Gaza as I can in the coming year or at least until I can go again.

DOES ANYONE KNOW THIS KID'S NAME?!
I found a picture of him, thankfully. Now I can remember his face but still not his name.
...now that I've stared at this photo for a few minutes, I'm starting to doubt that this is the no-named kid. He might be Ali. It's like I never went.

Gaza Story: Building from Nothing

2011-07-24T00:01:00.005-05:00

While I was in Gaza, I completed an internship with a major NGO headquartered in Gaza City. I was so excited to do this internship and it was the main factor that helped me convince my parents to let me go to Gaza. I convinced them that I could only get into law school with something on my resume to distinguish me from others and an international internship in the middle of a war zone would surely suffice.

My internship didn't at all turn out the way I expected. That may have been because I expected too much or the NGO misunderstood my background and expected me to show up and just punch out ground breaking journalism as soon as I arrived, either way not much happened.

Eventually, the director of the NGO came into the office where I was given a desk and yelled at me. It was strange being scolded by man I didn't know and was made even worse by the fact that he was the highest authority at the NGO. He told me I was wasting a great opportunity, that I should create work for myself, I am in a better position than other internationals because I speak Arabic and was staying in a camp, and that I needed get more done as quickly as possible. After that embarrassing experience, I stopped waiting for guidance from the employees at the NGO, stopped asking my superiors to assign me tasks, and simply came up with topics and googled up a storm to learn more about them. I worked really hard and produced some pieces that I was quite proud of. My supervisor, who was second in command at the NGO, told me he was very impressed and promised that they'd soon be published. Every time I asked him how soon they'd be published, he'd say that the lawyers were looking over my writings to make sure everything was ok. Then came the end of my trip. When I got home, I constantly checked the NGO's website for my articles and every time there was nothing. After one month and several emails, I realized that they weren't going to publish my work. Below is one of the pieces I wrote after interviewing a Gazan contractor. Since I put in the work, it might as well get published somewhere.

Narratives Under Siege: Building from Nothing

With one of the fastest growing populations in the world, growth and expansion should be inevitable in Gaza. Development should be steady and business for contractors should be guaranteed. Gaza, however, is not like any other place in the world. Life and business for a contractor are shaped by siege, bombardment, destruction, and occupation.

As a contractor also involved in the trading of construction materials, Awad Baker's work was steady and provided his family with a standard of living far more comfortable than the average family in Maghazi refugee camp, located in the heart of the Gaza Strip. Recently, however, work has not been the same. Before the siege on Gaza was intensified in 2007, Baker's contracting company had an annual revenue ranging between $1 million and $1.5 million. For the past three years of siege, the company has accrued zero revenue.

In order to sustain his family during this period, Baker was forced to drain his savings and has even resorted to selling some of his privately owned property to maintain his business. Prior to the siege, Baker's company employed over 30 laborers who each were the breadwinners of their families. Each of these men was responsible for providing for his family, and with the Gazan fertility rate, this amounted to about 10 members per family on average. Now, many of these families survive only on UNRWA donations, unemployment benefits (which only last the first three months of joblessness), and aid from humanitarian groups; and sadly, the rest have been consumed by debt.

Baker is presently working on constructing an UNRWA boys junior high school in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza Strip. This has been the largest project he has worked on in three years, and it is only possible because of the recent Israeli decision to permit the construction of new UNRWA schools in Gaza. Out of the 60 proposed schools, this is one of six that Israeli authorities have permitted the importation of building materials into the Gaza Strip for its construction.

With the high rate of population growth in Gaza and the lack of building materials to accommodate the growing number of students, the educational system in Gaza is crumbling. Israel's refusal to allow UNRWA officials and Gazans alike to build the necessary number of schools to ensure that the children of Gaza earn basic levels of education violates article 50 of the Fourth Geneva convention which states that "The Occupying Power shall, with the cooperation of the national and local authorities, facilitate the proper working of all institutions devoted to the care and education of children."

Baker explains how at one point during the siege, his company built an UNRWA school made entirely of iron containers that once stored aid materials. "We opened the containers and connected two to each other, adding windows and doors. The kids would get so hot in the summer. We built a whole school this way," Baker elaborates.

For three years, Baker's company did not purchase any construction materials smuggled in from the tunnels, but after sitting idle waiting for the political situation to improve, the company decided that stagnation was not an option. During this period of siege, several sources of building materials have become available to contractors: cement and steel smuggled in from the tunnels, the crushed remains of houses attacked during the war on Gaza two years ago, the gravel that young men excavate and sell, and "aggregate" which is a combination of sand and crushed sea shells. "When we're not building for UNRWA [and don't have access to materials from Israel], we purchase gravel that is dug up, crushed cement, aggregate, and cement and steel from the tunnels to build projects. It is the poorest quality and we have to include additional cement to strengthen the structures," Baker admitted. Baker explains that, "When we use materials from the tunnels, as we have this past year, we can only work very small projects… With the tunnel materials, we can only complete about 10% of the volume of work that we had before the siege. That only amounts to about 6% of the profits we had before."

Times are difficult for all of the residents of the Gaza Strip and Awad Baker is no exception. He is resentful that no international or domestic organizations stepped in to support him and others like him and protect them from economic collapse when the siege began; "ask me if anyone gave us support or offered us alternative work. The answer is no. No one helped."

High School Reunion

2011-07-22T04:48:00.002-05:00

Ok, so I'm not old enough to even discuss my high school reunion yet, but I recently had lunch with a girl I knew in high school, and it was.. different.

I recognize that we all change after high school, and now that it's been five years since I graduated, I expect that most of the kids I knew in high school only share the name and facial structure (plus thirty pounds) of the person I knew five years ago. Even with this in mind, the rendezvous was still not how I expected it.

Ok, I arrived before she did and I was incredibly overdressed leading her to constantly apologize while simultaneously complimenting me, and it's never easy to deflect both at the same time. Maybe this made me a little big headed or made her feel a little upstaged, I don't know. Altogether it wasn't an unpleasant luncheon, just not what I expected.

I was dressed for a gathering I was going to after our meeting at a family friend's house but I figured it was still casual enough not to be weird for a lunch at a buffet. I knew this girl pretty well in high school so I wasn't nervous about seeing her again. We had AP classes together and were both in student council. She was class president and I was trying to pick up a resume boosting extracurricular activity. We both gave speeches at graduation. We went on trips together and planned school spirit week events. This lunch should have been smooth sailing.

We met so that she could give me advice on how to have a successful first year of law school. She began law school the summer after finishing her bachelors. I have a lot of respect for her because of this; she was able to quickly figure out what she wanted to do and made it reality. As a girl who wasted a summer pretending she didn't have a major dilemma waiting to be solved, I recognize my high school friend's ambition and dedication to finding success. As previous posts have made clear, I am terrified of starting law school and our lunch was supposed to help settle my nerves and provide me with useful tips that will come in handy in the coming months.

Then we started talking about the LSAT and applying to law schools and grades and all of that other really sensitive stuff. I learned during my sophomore year of high school not to discuss these things with people I wasn't very close with because it only opens the door for resentment. I have generally excelled academically and although most people I encounter seem to be very proud of my success and share my happiness, there are a select few who have either attempted to minimize it or attribute it to factors outside of my control. I've been called a cheater, told that I got the easier version of the test, told that I went to a dumber school, people have even claimed my teachers didn't really grade our work and simply assigned grades. Although I don't keep my success a secret because I feel people will be encouraged by learning about what I have accomplished, I know better than to volunteer unnecessary information.

When my friend spoke about how terrible her LSAT score was and how she didn't study, I didn't mention my LSAT prep-course or my 8th percentile score. When she explained that she didn't get into the law school of her alma mater, I didn't tell her I was offered a full ride scholarship two weeks after I sent in my application. When she complained about all of the debt she'd be in for the next decade, I made sure not to tell her about my full ride scholarship to the school I'd soon attend. But when she began bashing the top tier law schools in Texas, schools that I applied and got into, one of which I would soon attend, I felt a little uneasy. I understand that sometimes when we are disappointed in how things turn out, we tend to rationalize them until we are pleased with the outcome we received. That's likely what she was doing and I don't get joy out of putting people down, so I didn't defend my institution. It's hard for me to hold my tongue and as the lunch progressed, I found myself holding my tongue more and more. I was very uncomfortable.

Then we shared with each other what motivated us to go to law school. She had a beautiful reason; she was passionate about education and wanted to change the public policies that shape our education system. I was so impressed and proud of my old high school friend; how selfless of her to want to dedicate her life to this issue. She then asked me to share my reason and I said something about discrimination against Muslim-Americans and secret prisons and bogus charges and likely exponentially increased the amount of discomfort at the table. She tried to sound encouraging but it didn't pass as genuine. I didn't mention it earlier but there was another person present at the lunch. He was a friend of her friend's, much older than us, and to my great joy, an Iraq war veteran. Yay. He then gave his condescending version of encouragement that involved applauding me for not being illiterate, not being in an abusive marriage, and not wearing a niqab. As if things weren't uncomfortable enough already... I refrained from ripping him apart and calling him names because, honestly, he didn't seem worth it. I didn't want to create a situation that could only end with me storming off because I really wanted to hear the advice my friend had to offer.

The advice was pretty generic and there wasn't anything new that she said that I hadn't heard already, but I truly think I benefitted-- I'm no where near as scared as I was before. Now success in law school seems very feasible.

I learned a few important lessons from this encounter: first, I probably won't be going to my high school reunion in five years, second, I'm not as behind in life as I thought and my future seems promising, and third, I don't know the people I went to high school with any more. I still feel like high school was only yesterday, but I'm slowly realizing how much I've changed since then. I was pretty much a geek in high school and thank goodness for that! I ended up more prepared for college, wasn't held back by my loser high school friends that never made anything of themselves, and hopefully now I have my priorities in order. It looks like Academic Decathlon, Quiz League, Future Business Leaders of America, National Technical Honor Society, and regular National Honor Society helped me more than I thought.

P.S. I also learned that talking about politics and criticizing America will get people quiet quick, especially when one of them is a veteran of a gulf war.

Grandparents I wish I Knew

2011-07-20T02:46:00.001-05:00

About a week and a half ago, I was at Friday prayer at the masjid that I grew up going to when I saw the cutest old lady in the world. She was this 75 year old Kurdish woman thumbing her prayer beads as she listened to the sermon she most likely didn't understand. She had a round tan face and a wide smile framed by thin weathered lips; she looked exactly like my paternal grandmother and I found her adorable.

As I peered at her and smiled, a twenty-something girl approached her, greeted her with multiple kisses and a hug, and sat beside her. The old lady looked lovingly at the girl beside her, reached for her hand and patted it softly for the remainder of the sermon. I watched my grandmother's lookalike show affection to the girl of my age and before I knew it, tears were streaming down my face. It was so sweet and genuine and so unfamiliar to me. I don't remember much of the grandparents I did meet, and seeing this woman who so uncannily resembled my grandmother exhibit her love for her granddaughter made me wonder what I missed out on.

This post is dedicated to my grandparents, four people I wish I could have known better. Four people who should have played vital roles in my life, people I should have gone to for advice, people whose wisdom I should have learned life lessons from, people whose warm embraces should have shaped my childhood, people who I wish I could make proud.

My Bedouin side:

Paternal Grandfather

My paternal grandfather died before I was born, so I have no memories of him. I know he was the product of his times. He had a hot temper, he was strict and expected the absolute best of his family, he never carried any of his children, and everyone always knew better than to mess with him. He held on to the century old ways of the Bedouins and never lost touch with the struggles of his people. My father and my aunts speak about him like he was the godfather, like he ruled the world he lived in and everyone around him knew it and feared him for it.

My mother describes him differently. When I ask her to describe her father-in-law, she tells me about how respectful, honorable, humble, and gentle he was. He treated her even better than he treated his daughters; she was a young girl when she got married and he did everything in his power to make this tough transition as easy as he could for her. My older brother was the first baby he ever carried. My grandfather was tough and masculine, but he perfectly balanced that with his humility and gentle nature. Till this day (about 24 years since his passing), when my mother is stressed or feeling troubled, he appears to her in her dreams to comfort her and give her advice. I've never heard of such a bond between any woman and her father-in-law, but clearly no other man was like my grandfather. As our late patriarch, his influence is still prevalent in our family in a manner not uncommon amongst Arabs; we have six boys in our family named after him, including my youngest brother.

Paternal Grandfather holding my older brother.

My paternal grandmother died when I was fifteen and I spent a lot of time with her during the three years I lived in Gaza. This frame of time ranges from when I was two until I was five, so naturally I don't have very vivid memories of her, but I did know her better than her late husband. She was tall and sturdy, just by looking at her, you knew she was the mother of men.

Paternal Grandmother

I remember how she always had her henna stained orange hair plated into two braids and covered with a small paisley scarf. I remember she always wore a beautiful handmade Palestinian toub. When we left the house, she had a thin white tarha rapped over her head and shoulders and tucked into her mouth. She always wore earrings and she was known for piercing ears, a service she provided with the use of only a needle and some thread. I remember going to the souq in Khan Yunis with her once and she bought me kharroub to drink from a street vendor. When I was in Gaza this winter, I made sure to drink some and I thought of her and this blurred distant memory we shared.

Every time my mother hears an old woman reciting a muwwaal, or a traditional Palestinian form of oral poetic folklore, she tells me my grandmother was an incredible poet. She reminds me that poetic wisdom isn't something taught in schools, that the lessons learned by an illiterate refugee of a nomadic animal herding life are what fueled the creative and rhythmic flow of words my grandmother was known for. She never said anything that didn't include a history lesson and countless hidden meanings. She spoke the way Arabs have spoken for thousands of years and she carried with her the wisdom of all these years.

Photo frame in my aunt's house of my paternal grandparents.

My Yaffa side:

Maternal Grandfather

My maternal grandfather died when I was about seven years old. I don't have many memories of him either. He was born in 1909, thus the three years I spent with him in the early 90s did not accurately reflect the man he was most of his life. I remember he had very fair skin that was covered in little brown age spots, he had no hair on his head but all of his teeth, and he always wore a white kufi. I remember he had the longest ears I had ever seen in my life, they fascinated me and until now, when I see a Buddha with long droopy ears, I think of my seedo. The only real memories I have of him are of my grandmother feeding him soup but I will always have nothing but respect for him because I know the tenderness my grandmother showed him in his last years were a reflection of the decades of kind treatment he showed her.

My mother tells me about how calm and serene her father always was. He never raised his voice and was well known in the camp for his shoemaking business. For the first seven years of her life, my mother thought her last name was Bint il Kundarji, or daughter of the shoemaker. My mother tells me how my grandfathers were friends with one another and greeted each other daily because my maternal grandfather's shoe shop faced my paternal grandfather's corner store and they opened and closed their stores together.

She tells me stories about how my grandfather would take the family to back to Yaffa every time they had a break from school and he would show them around the town where he and his wife grew up. Then he would take them to the beach so that they could enjoy the beauty of their hometown. He was always gentle and kind with his wife and children, treating them to the best life he could offer them.

Maternal Grandmother

I knew my maternal grandmother the best, she died when I was twenty-one. She was the only grandparent I got to spend time with in 2004 and I treasured the moments I spent with her. She was very ill the last decade of her life and sometimes was a handful for my uncle and his family to deal with, but none of us ever lost sight of the unbelievable woman she was. I remember how she appreciated even the most minute things people did for her and in return she was constantly praying for God to shower them with His favors. She used to peel figs before she ate them. She always spoke so kindly of my grandfather, reminding us of how kind her late husband was to all those who knew him.

She had a tough life filled with many hardships, but she always endured and it strengthened her resolve. She was a seamstress and she taught her trade to all of the young girls of the camp who had the time to learn. She made custom dresses for brides and made most of my mother's childhood clothes. She was an entrepreneur and she gave all of herself to her family.

Maternal Grandmother in 2004

When my mother was a child, my grandmother would walk ahead of her in the street so that my mother could walk in her shade and be shielded from the hot rays of the sun. When it would rain, my grandmother would circle their mud brick house, closing any gaps where the mud was wearing low so that they could stay dry inside the house. She would do this and explain to my young mother that their "chocolate house" was melting and she was preserving it so my mother could eat it later. She was kind and compassionate and the only grandparent I ever knew. Sadly, I still didn't get all the time I wanted with her.

Maternal Grandparents

***

May God have mercy on my grandparents. I pray one day for the fulfillment of the right of return so that Palestinians no longer have to be displaced or separated from their loved ones. I pray that military occupation and siege do not break up any more families and that all children are given the joy of growing up surrounded by their grandparents and the honor of one day making them proud.

God Bless Skype

2011-07-17T17:07:00.004-05:00

I don't know why I stay up this late, but I was on facebook at 3AM when my uncle in Gaza signed in and asked me to get on skype. I was amused that my uncle, a man who lives in a refugee camp, automatically assumed I had a skype account. He was right, I did.

I spoke to him, his wife, his six kids, and his mother (my father's step-mother, a woman who gladly serves as my extra grandparent) for over an hour. It was the best hour and a half of my summer. The kids were so fascinated and excited, my grandmother was so happy and constantly said little prayers for me, and I got all of the news of the family. Apparently my uncle has a conference in Lebanon coming up but he's already been turned back at the Rafah crossing once so he's unsure if he'll get through before the conference begins; my cousin's wife had a baby; my uncle, whose house was destroyed during Cast Lead, has begun rebuilding.. finally; and my aunt who lives in Saudi and summers in Jordan will be spending Ramadan in Gaza with our relatives this year.

I want to thank the creators of skype for being so awesome and making it possible for me to play peek-a-boo with my baby cousin 7,000 miles away. She loved it. I know I complain a lot about being away from my relatives, but I also do what I can to maintain the bonds I have with them and skype is one of the greatest tools for this.

Who wouldn't want to play peek-a-boo with this adorable kid?

So Lost..

2011-07-15T01:47:00.000-05:00

I'm freaking out. I don't trust my friends enough to ask for their advice. Not that I think they'll give me bad advice, I just think they'll be excited to tell people the "news" I share with them. I'm also afraid that they'll taunt me for months after I ask for their advice.

I'm trying to think of friends who have gone through what I'm going through and, again, I either don't trust them or we've drifted so far apart that I don't trust that they'll be as understanding as I'd like or be as open and honest as I need.

I've prayed Istikhara like five times and I have no idea how to know the result of it. I read that you're supposed to pray and then make a decision and God will choose for you by either making the path you chose easy or difficult. My problem is that I'm scared to make any decision. I swear I'm putting my faith in God, but I still have no idea. I don't know what to do and my family is only making things infinitely worse.

I'm feeling pressure to just go with it, but I don't feel comfortable at all making that choice. I wish this were easier. I wish I had more concrete emotions. I wish I knew what I wanted. I wish I were more pragmatic. I wish I thought things out more systematically. I wish I had my mother's wisdom and experience. I wish I wasn't petrified of this step.

I'm not a kid.. so why do I feel like one? Why does it feel like I'm incapable of making this decision for myself? Why does it seem like everyone else is so excited to take this step when it only makes me upset and depressed? Isn't that a bad sign?

I feel like I'm going to vomit.

Feeling Like an Exile

2011-07-14T15:45:00.003-05:00

In 2004, I met my cousins and grew fairly attached to them. After we returned to the U.S., it took over a month for me to stop my ritual nightly crying over how deeply I missed them. I cried for many reasons, but I think one of the biggest one was because I knew it would be a long time before I'd again get to see these people I grew to love in Gaza.

When my older cousins got married, I was genuinely excited for them but still filled with sorrow that I didn't have the opportunity to participate in the family celebrations surrounding the wedding. When the cousins my age got married, I was sad for another reason as well. I knew that future trips to Gaza would no longer involve fun excursions with my cousins and that sleepovers were out of the question. All of the memories I had of Gaza were destined only to be memories, not beginnings of long stories that would pick up every summer. I had to come to the realization that, although I was only given one childhood trip home to play with my cousins, my childhood was over. I'd never again have the chance to experience summer break, beach-side outings, amusement parks, shopping trips, and wedding parties with a large interwoven network of cousins within a few years of my age. My cousins were growing up and taking with them my opportunity to find entertainment in Gaza. Basically, I reacted to all news selfishly. I didn't think about how my 19 year old cousin's childhood was over too, that she'd have a baby a year from now, that she'd be living in a house with 20 of her in-laws, that she'd be kissing away her hope of working one day; I only thought about how her decision would effect my hypothetical future travel plans.

I wanted to feel like I belonged to a big family that was bettered by having me as a member. I was tired of feeling like an unwelcome transplant in the U.S.

During my 2010-2011 trip, I spent much more of my time with younger, childless, unmarried cousins who were still in college or high school and it was a little like the 2004 trip but with more independence, freedom, and insight. But I also learned that just because most of the cousins I grew close to in 2004 were married, it didn't mean that they were erased from the family. Before this trip, I only knew about Arab girls in the U.S. who get married and move far away from their families and their parents sit at home alone once their kids are married. Gaza is different; no one goes away, no one is transformed into just a voice on the phone, no one disappears. I saw my married cousins about every week and we still had sleepovers, granted they weren't as much fun since they were all either pregnant and tired all the time or had babies they had to tend to. But still, we were able to pick up were we left off in 2004 and although the plot had gained some unexpected twists and turns, it was the same story.

This time around, my favorite cousin from the 2010-2011 trip is getting married. As I write this she is dancing at her henna party with her mom's sisters, her mom's sisters-in-law, all of their daughters, her friends, her neighbors, and her new in-laws but no one from her father's side. I am her father's side. Me. Just me. And I'm typing away on my laptop somewhere across the world, a place she's never been and will likely never go. All I can think about is how I should be there, how I belong there, how beautiful my cousin looks, how perfectly her dress fits her, how cute my hair would have been styled, how pretty my dress would have been, how gracefully we would have danced together...

In a sense, this is the exact reason why we should be granted our right of return. My cousin has no relatives from her dad's side present at her henna and soon none at her wedding either, but she has an aunt in Texas, uncles in Germany and Ohio, and her father's extended family is spread everywhere in the world from Canada to Saudi Arabia. I guess this is exactly what it means to be displaced.

But instead of feeling like a refugee, I feel like an exile. Like no matter what I do, I won't be able to reenter my homeland. Like I have been put out, never to return. Like as time passes, my ability to return and re-assimilate into society will grow more impossible. Like I have done something to merit my forced removal from and barred return to my nation. It feels like it's not even mine anymore, like I can't claim it.

This time, as my younger cousin gets married and other younger cousins begin to marry, I don't dread on the lost opportunities for fun and enjoyment, I mourn the sense of loss and distance that come with being away from my homeland and my loved ones. Not only have I been denied a role in my nation's liberation and feelings of national citizenship, I've also been denied my extended family and the ability to take part in OUR celebrations.

Decorated car that will transport a Gazan bride and groom to their wedding

Not a KKK member, Gazan bride wearing a cape to conceal her hair and body as she makes her way to her wedding.

Refugee camp wedding in Gaza.

Stay Human

2011-07-12T23:32:00.001-05:00

I just finished reading Vittorio Arrigoni's book Gaza: Stay Human and I have so many things going through my mind that they're hard to sort through.

First off, it's an incredible look into what it was like living through Israel's most recent offensive on Gaza, codenamed "Operation Cast Lead." You read stories about homes destroyed, entire families massacred, the danger that paramedics faced attempting to retrieve the injured, eyewitness accounts of the war crimes committed, lone children who are left the only survivors of their families, young children nurturing the decaying bodies of their fallen mothers, and most importantly the resolve of the people enduring this torture. He wrote almost daily during the war, which is evident if one watches "To Shoot an Elephant," a film that follows the massacre from day one featuring Vittorio and other international activists. Before he was tragically murdered, Vittorio vowed to send a portion of the proceeds to the Palestinian Center for Democracy and Conflict Resolution for its dedication to protecting children in the Palestinian territories.

The only other in depth look I got into living the war and experiencing the loss of loved ones was in reading Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish's "I Shall Not Hate," another book I strongly recommend. The difference between Vittorio's book and Dr. Abuelaish's book was that Vittorio's was an eyewitness daily account composed by a person who spent time in hospitals, riding in ambulances, speaking at press conferences, meeting with those who have lost family members, speaking with hospital patients, and moving about the entire Strip while risking his life to help as many people as he could. Dr. Abuelaish's book, on the other hand, was more of an autobiography, his recollection of the war, what it was like enduring painful losses, and the choices he made in his process of reconciliation.

While reading "Gaza: Stay Human," all I could think was how terrible this massacre truly was, how brave the people who survived it are, and the psychological and emotion toll it played on them. It helped me understand why my parents worked so hard to flee Gaza and what they were trying to protect me from, but it also made me envy the courage of those who stayed and endured the bloodbath because nothing can scare their love of nation out of them. It made me jealous of the international activists like Vittorio who risked their lives to stay in Gaza, to defend human rights and protect the innocent people of Gaza from the brutal military backed by all of the world powers attacking them. It made me question myself and my sincerity to the Palestinian cause.

I remember when I was in Gaza earlier this year, I would stay up all night fearful of the thunder I heard thinking it was shelling. I can't imagine surviving the atrocities that Vittorio outlined. Simply reading his descriptions of the damage and the suffering was almost too much to bear, I can't fathom having actually seen them in person or living them as an orphan or widow. During the war, I spoke to my cousin who lived in Tal el Hawa with her husband and his family and she told me about how they fled their apartment and about white phosphorous burning through the roof of the taxi that they all managed to cram into and not drinking water for two weeks but even these stories seemed insignificant next to the facts Vittorio shares in this book. Reading this book really gives you an inside look into the depth of the suffering and the magnitude of the genocide that took place in Gaza only two and a half years ago.

When I was in Gaza recently, I constantly asked those around me about the war because I wanted to hear which parts of it they chose to remember and which parts they struggled to forget. Unsurprisingly, most people didn't want to talk about the war and when they did, I always wished I hadn't asked. Their mood is changed for the remainder of the time I spend with them and it's clear that even though the massacre is long over, it still haunts their thoughts and memory. I've written about kids not sleeping in rooms by themselves and the bedwetting issues, but the psychological damage that kids in Gaza face post-war are much greater. During my internship, we published a press release about a Gazan doctor named Iyad el Sarraj who was awarded the Olof Palme Prize, an international award, for his research on the psychological effects of trauma on children, and I imagine that was because sadly he had plenty to study and report on. You can read about the first traces of this damage when Vittorio describes pictures drawn by children he finds in an abandoned and destroyed house.

As a member of the Palestinian diaspora who has traveled back to Palestine, it is very clear that the Palestinians who never left consider us to be lucky because we were given the opportunities that they only dreamed of. I, however, have never felt lucky. I imagine that during the three weeks of the Gaza massacre, my parents grew even more certain that their decision to leave Palestine permanently was the right one. They were probably grateful that they did not fear for our safety or worry that we'd freeze or starve to death. They were probably very appreciative for the blessing of not having to bury any of their children or flee their home. I, on the other hand, envy the people of Gaza, not because I wish to suffer or feel pain but because they are part of their nation's liberation narrative, by struggling to survive they are personally defeating Zionism, they are standing up for their rights and the rights of exploited indigenous populations worldwide because through our suffering, we are one. The people of Gaza were victims of war crimes, yes; but they were also champions of steadfastness and perseverance. They were heroic even as they fled their homes to seek shelter in UN schools, they were heroic when they marched through the alleys of their camps with white flags, and they were heroic when they accepted their fate and immediately sought out ways to recuperate and heal and find peace within themselves. Vittorio shared what he saw between December 27th, 2008 and January 18th, 2009 but more importantly he expressed the true nature of the Palestinian people, a people with roots so deeply entrenched in their homeland and spirits so strong that they cannot and will not ever be defeated.

Vittorio's courage made me wonder how I can call myself a Palestinian or claim that I love my country and want to see it liberated when I myself do nothing to bring this about. He is an Italian, not a Palestinian raised in Italy or an Italian with Arab ancestry. He has no blood or documents tying him to the land of Palestine, yet he was willing to risk his life to uncover truth, protect children, and defend human rights. What have I done? I've done nothing. This is not an excuse for self-pity, it's a call for me and others like me to back our words with actions and do what Palestine needs us to do. We are grateful for the internationals who travel thousands of miles to assist us in our struggle for justice and freedom, but this is our battle and we need to find the passion within ourselves to fight it. Vittorio was and still is an inspiration and I draw from his life and his experiences the will to do more and I sincerely hope others do too, or else Palestine has no hope.

Buy and read this book.

I'm Tired

2011-07-10T03:59:00.002-05:00

So I just finished reading an incredible book by Omar Barghouti (the love of my life) called Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions: The Global Struggle for Palestinian Rights. In this book, Mr. Barghouti (or Omar, as I like to call him) speaks a lot about the sense of entitlement that Westerners and Israelis have. I also learned a lot about this in several political science courses I took in college, normally in the context of defeated colored peoples criticizing the arrogance of the white people who exploited and destroyed their civilization.

With Israelis, this sense of entitlement seems to derive from the idea that Jews are God's "chosen people." Apparently this makes them feel entitled to certain things that wouldn't be permitted for any other citizens of the world, this may include but not be limited to: other people's land, other people's homes, other people's cultural identity, immunity from international law, permission to violate human rights, mass murder with no repercussions, and dehumanizing an entire nation. Other roots for the false Israeli sense of entitlement may be the belief that they are the keepers of democracy in the Middle East, that they are more "modern" and thus more deserving of power and rule, that their fairer skin and Western origins make them superior to the barbaric savages they control, and that their past suffering means they should enjoy impunity in inflicting suffering upon others. No matter where it originates, it's wrong.

Let me make it clear that I believe Islam is the only pure and true religion still in existence and that God favors Muslims above others because they have chosen to follow His final messenger and His holy book, Al-Quran, and that only followers of God's religion will enter paradise. Now, do I think the life of a Muslim is more valuable than the life of a non-Muslim? No. Do I think Muslims should be entitled to special rights and privileges that non-Muslims shouldn't be entitled to? No. You can follow a religion that promotes its exclusive access to paradise and still be tolerant of and just with those who disagree with you. The matters of the afterlife are for God alone to deal with, not each religious group.

Let me also make it clear that I believe Palestine is the most beautiful place on earth with the most fertile soil, most generous people, most incredible beaches, richest history, and is highly blessed. Although I love Palestine, I don't think others should suffer in order to serve Palestine's interests. I don't think Palestine should invade other countries to maintain her people's internationally and environmentally exploitative lifestyles. I don't think hundreds of thousands of people should die because Palestinians fear them. I love Palestine, but never at the expense of others.

My point is that I am tired of Israelis and Westerners claiming that they are superior to people of color or the Global South or the Third World or the developing nations. I am tired of their insistence that they are entitled to the resources of others because of their claimed superiority. I am tired of Americans pretending that their 5,000 dead soldiers are more valuable and merit a greater loss than the 1.5 million Iraqis and Afghanis that they killed. I am tired of seeing war criminals celebrated because the world refuses to acknowledge the equal worth of all human beings. I am tired of hearing about Gilad effing Shalit when nearly 10,000 illegally imprisoned Palestinians rot in Israeli jails with no one advocating for them or calling for their release. I am tired of Obama making pleas for the security and safety of Israeli children and completely ignoring the much worse suffering of Palestinian children. I am tired of my fellow Americans thinking that their comfort is worth excusing the suffering and murder of others. I'm tired of immigrants being treated like worthless scum. I'm tired of all of this arrogance.

As one wise Palestinian continues to say, stay human. When we bring ourselves down to that simple identity, we can't claim any one human is more valuable than another and we can't ignore the suffering of any of our human brothers.

Where are the Arab Men?

2011-07-10T03:06:00.002-05:00

I think everyone thinks the same thing after many failed attempts at meeting the right person, "aren't there any decent people out there who want the same things in life as me?"

My mom is a traditional Arab mother. She's more conservative than most, but also smarter and more understanding. She has a mini panic attack when I tell her I wouldn't mind marrying a Black guy, but other than that, she's dying for me to get married and have lots of babies for her to babysit as I build my career.

She had a very strange conversation with the wife of our Imam recently. A conversation that was centered around me but in no way involved my input or even remotely reflected my sentiments toward our religious leader or his wife. The conversation went a little like this:

Mama: Hey [Imam's wife], what have we benefited from you? You're supposed to be our Imam's wife and send promising suitors for our daughter. Why haven't you sent anyone? You're not doing your job.

Imam's wife: What do you want me to say? There are no guys. All of the guys that are religious work fixing cars or something and they're happy and making money, but they have no educations. All of the girls have college educations and only want college educated guys, what do we do?

First of all, I am not dying to get married and frankly the idea terrifies me, so I'm not sure why my mom felt the need to verbally attack the Imam's wife. Second of all, where are all of the decent Arab guys who want what I want in life?

I recognize that there are probably plenty of decent guys out there who are existing just below the Arab-mother-desperate-to-marry-her-daughter-off radar and probably a few more who are still trying to "figure things out" before they tie the knot and most likely a few who are morbidly afraid of rejection, preferring loneliness and boredom to actually asking for a girl's hand. That, however, does not change the fact that, after being bothered by a few losers and weirdos, it feels like the marriage pool is far too small.

Why aren't there more religious, educated, charming, charismatic, family-oriented, and moderately attractive guys out there? I don't expect to marry a prince charming, but I expect a few more guys to resemble him at least a little so that I can still have hope. During my time in college, not a single Arab guy from the metro area attended my university while I was there. Plenty of girls got in and even earned full ride scholarships to our not-that-hard-to-get-into school but not a single Arab guy was able to achieve that feat. The community college was and is full of Arab guys failing most of their courses while they work part-time at their dad's _______ shop and master the art of blowing out rings of hookah smoke, but it seems that not many put in the same time and effort to excel academically.

Arabs were once a great people, I am told, but I find this impossible to believe when we can't even produce a handful of brilliant thinkers every few generations. We can't even get our boys dedicated enough to stay chaste until marriage and finish a college degree on time. If, by a miracle, there is an Arab boy who does salvage enough of his brain cells after smoking more hookah than he breathes Oxygen to finish college, he ends up being the guy who goes by "Moe" that all of the Tri Deltas know far too intimately.

This may seem like an attack on the Arab man, but I honestly think we as a race are not any less capable of producing Grade-A men. I have three brothers who all had/have the potential to be 'prince charmings' to their generation of Arab girls. (Good work, Mama.) I wonder, then, why there aren't other guys who have things slightly put together. Arab girls of my generation seem to be quite hard working and persistent when it comes to academic and career goals. This may be a direct result of their awareness of the sexism that exists in our culture where women are treated oftentimes as subhuman maids/cooks/baby-machines that are programed to be unfathomably dependent on their husbands. I can understand why that would motivate girls to work extra hard on earning an education and a sense of independence, but what results is being over-qualified to fill the role of "Arab wife." What happens next?

That's the next important question; what are girls like me left to do when all the Arab guys in our area are too lame for us to marry? Lower our standards? Ok, fine. I'll marry a guy still in college, a guy with not very much savings, a guy whose immigration status is not ideal, a guy with little personality etc. My only issue is understanding how I am supposed to learn to cope with these lowered standards? I'm afraid I'll always resent this man or be embarrassed of him or repulsed by him, and we all know that the only thing worse than being overqualified for being an "Arab wife" is being an overqualified divorcee.

What a dilemma.

Immigrant vs. Refugee

2011-07-01T06:57:00.003-05:00

I guess, technically, I'm not a refugee.

My parents are in the U.S. under political asylum-- so maybe they can still be considered refugees, but I think the more accurate term to describe them is immigrants. True, they did move to the U.S. to escape war, but I think it was less because of the danger it posed to their lives than about the poverty they were avoiding. Again, I assert that my parents can more aptly be described as immigrants, not refugees.

I feel like a refugee doesn't leave by choice, that they want to stay in their homeland, but they don't have that option if they intend to live a long life. My parents didn't want to stay and they don't want to return, thus they are not refugees.

I, on the other hand, feel like a refugee.

But, if my parents are immigrants and not refugees, that would make me a second generation-immigrant and thus my primary identity should be with my nationality not the nationality my parents rejected. I should have a very distant tie with my parents' land of origin, referring to it as the place of their origin and considering myself only an American. But that's not the case.

I took a class in college called "Race, Ethnicity, and Politics" and it was taught by the daughter of a Mexican immigrant and an Anglo-American. We spent a lot of time discussing immigrants in the U.S. and their views on politics and their levels of assimilation based on region and what generation they are. We talked about their identities and language proficiency and their rates of intermarriage. I learned a lot and grew very weary of my status as a second generation-immigrant. The studies show that my children are most likely not going to speak Arabic, or identify as Palestinians, or marry from our community. As my brother and I put it, my kids will be white-washed skaters. I absolutely don't want this and it's one of my worst fears.

Another eye-opening experience I had relating to my status as a second generation-immigrant was in high school. I was talking to my second generation-immigrant friend from Vietnam. I was asking her about Vietnam and trying to understand how much she identified with the different parts of her identity. I quickly found out that she had no interest in Vietnam whatsoever. Even though this girl was deeply entrenched in the Vietnamese-American community (she went to a Vietnamese-American church, all of her closest friends were Vietnamese, every guy she'd ever dated was Vietnamese, she worked at a Vietnamese restaurant.. etc.), she had no interest in her place of origin. She said it was dirty and people were poor and had no opportunities for education or work. I asked her if it was unsafe, and she said no. I asked why she didn't want to visit and she said it just didn't interest her and that she'd rather visit other areas of the world. I asked if she'd ever think about moving there and she immediately responded with a harsh no. I asked her if her opinion would change if some of the problems in Vietnam would be solved and she said no.

I couldn't understand how she could identify so strongly with her Vietnamese-American identity while simultaneously rejecting Vietnam. I was so different from her. It had been two years since my 2004 trip to Palestine and I constantly prayed that my parents would be granted green cards so that we could travel again and more regularly. I was in love with Palestine and everything about it. I craved her foods and her stories and her folk culture and the company of her people. I couldn't imagine never visiting. It never occurred to me that I could live anywhere outside of the U.S., so moving there didn't even cross my mind but I fully felt like yearly visits needed to be a vital part of my future. This helped me understand the difference between me and other second generation-immigrants and this is precisely why I reject my status as an immigrant.

I no longer want to spend my time proving to Americans how American I am by emphasizing my domestic birth and the slight Southern drawl in my Texan accent. I am tired of lying to myself and working so hard to fit in. I want to understand myself through my roots, the history of my family, the story of my people. I am the descendent of Nakba survivors and Bedouins and fruit merchants and shoemakers and seamstresses and farmers not plantation owners or factory workers or slaves or revolutionaries or Native Americans. No matter how much American schools tried to indoctrinate me into identifying with the American narrative, simple genealogy proves that it's not mine. I'm not part of the American fabric, unless it's normal for fabric to try to purge itself of certain threads that make it up because of their religion or national origin or politics. I don't think fabric works that way.

As soon as I learned that there was a right of return, I claimed it and transformed myself from a second generation-immigrant into a third generation-refugee.

I reserve the right to choose where I live, regardless of the fear-based decisions of my parents and grandparents. I am from Beir il-Saba' and Yaffa and I have the right to live in either of those cities if I so choose. So, even if it's not my prescribed identity, the fact that it's my ascribed identity is just as valid.

I am not an immigrant, I'm a refugee and I claim my right of return.

The UN in September: Good or Bad?

2011-06-22T16:39:00.002-05:00

Let me start by saying that I passionately support the one-state solution as the only viable solution to the Palestinian/Israeli conflict. This started with my endorsement of BDS back in 2009 which works in accordance with the 2005 Call to Action endorsed by over 170 Palestinian civil society groups which calls for the economic, cultural, and academic boycott of Israel, divestment from companies promoting and benefitting from the occupation, and sanctions of Israel until is recognizes Palestinian rights in three distinct areas. The areas of contention include ending the occupation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and dismantling the apartheid wall, granting Palestinian citizens of Israel full rights and equality with Jewish Israelis, and granting refugees their right of return or paying them reparations for their loss and suffering.

Once I put my energy into and placed my support behind the BDS movement, I also began my process of reconciliation. I began to see Israelis as human begins who have been led astray by their power hungry, fear-mongering politicians and finally a picture of a peaceful and just Palestine began to form in my mind. With these clear and well spelled out guidelines, it felt like for once there was a chance for justice and peace to coexist. It quickly became obvious that if justice, freedom, and equality were going to be granted to Palestinians, the only way would be if Palestine wasn't dissected and separated into Jewish and Palestinian areas but rather if it was again united into one state, this time democratic.

When I first became aware of the Palestinian plan to request state membership in the UN this September, I immediately felt euphoric. For decades the greatest Palestinian goal has been statehood. Mahmoud Darwish wrote beautifully sad and eloquent poems about being stateless and having no identity; finally our dream would be accomplished. Then I actually took time to think about what statehood would mean... We would be turning our backs on Palestine inside the green line; I am a refugee, inside the green line is the place I call home. What would happen to the right of return? What would happen to Palestinians with Israeli citizenship? Would they be ethnically cleansed from their homes and forced to relocate to the newly declared state of "Palestine?" What about the wall? The settlements? JERUSALEM?!?!?

I had so many questions; nothing seemed like it fit together. I remembered one of the anthems of the first intifada that we used to sing in my house even after the end of the intifada and after we moved to the U.S., it had a stanza referring to how Fateh and Arafat sold out and gave up on the Palestinian cause and Palestinian freedom when they went to the UN and renounced resistance in order to rule over a tiny fraction of our nation. The song went something like this:

qumtu aqsamtu il yameen
lat3oody ya Falasteen
bei3 traabik ma biseer
law raa7at hal raas

qultu il naser ghali yumma
w bikalifna kteeer
bnirda b7ukum thaaty yumma
balaaash il ta7reer

Translation:

You stood and swore
"Palestine would return (to our control)
Her soil will not be sold
Even if it means I lose my life"

Then you said, "victory is too costly, mother,
The price is too much to bear
We will be content with ruling over this area, mother,
Forget freedom"

All of a sudden I felt like, again, we were turning our back on our homeland, like we were betraying our promise to our displaced ancestors that we would free our lands, a feat they were unable to accomplish. I didn't know what to think. My dad's generation would have sold their parents for statehood; now its the last remnants of that generation that are making the desperate plea to the UN to grant us statehood. I decided to not have an opinion; I mean the PLO didn't hold an election to ask Palestinians what they thought of this move, so technically my opinion doesn't count and won't make a difference.

Then I read an incredible article on Electronic Intifada called "The Case for UN Recognition of Palestine" and it made me more confident that maybe some good will come out of this unilateral and undemocratic plan. Although I'm still not positive that I am behind Abbass' decision, I figure since my dissent won't change anything and Palestinians are supposedly "united," I might as well go with the flow. Here are the main reasons (as mentioned in the article above) for why I am semi-supportive of the bid for statehood this September:

- It does not automatically rule out the possibility of uniting all of Palestine and forming one democratic state

- Gives us the recognition we need to take Israel to the International Criminal Court for all of the crimes it has committed against us since 2002

- Gives us more leverage in stopping the settlements and dismantling the ones that exist

- We can take a more active role in preserving the Arab character of our capital, Jerusalem

- (this one's not in the article) Maybe once we have control of our borders, people from Gaza (including myself) will be able to enter the West Bank freely and go to our capital and pray in its holy sites.

*******

On a totally separate note, I want to say something about Syria and Libya. I wanted to do an entire blog post on this (and I still might), but it won't hurt to say something now too.

I feel like Palestinians are sometimes seen as self-centered in that they think they are the only people in the world suffering, very often this is an accurate assumption too, but I wanted to take the initiative to say that I think about our brothers and sisters in Libya and Syria everyday and pray for the end of their suffering and the resignation of their leaders. I feel the pain of Hamza al-Khateeb and Eman al-Obaidi and their families. I cried for them like I cried fro the women and children of Jenin when she was invaded and Gaza when she was massacred.

I think that it's important for us to recognize the struggles of others, especially if we expect them to understand our situation and that is why I make it a point to go to Libyan and Syrian solidarity events in my area to show that I am sensitive to all suffering, not just Palestinian suffering (sadly, I am usually the ONLY Palestinian at any of these events). We all need to join together if we plan on solving the issues our people face.

I felt like I needed to say that.

Life Goals... How Do I Know?

2011-06-15T13:08:00.001-05:00

I was terrified of graduating high school because I had no idea what I wanted to major in; I didn't know what I was interested in or passionate about. I hope this doesn't sound vain, but with the exception of basketball and Spanish, I've always been good at everything I've done. This was especially true when it came to academics. I didn't understand a single concept in pre-AP physics and I got an A plus both semesters. I was terrible at Spanish and I earned A pluses almost every one of the six semesters I took it. I was incredible at every math I attempted and loved them all because I was the class superstar, not because I cared at all about the subject. All of my teachers loved my writing and my classmates always asked me to proofread their essays, but I cared little for literature or grammar.

When I started college, I decided to major in biology with the next phase of my goal being pharmacy school. I wanted to have a career that required more than a single degree but wasn't too stressful or required so many hours of me that having a family one day would be impossible. Pharmacists don't work very many hours and their job is fairly simple and straightforward. All I had to do was get good grades and that's always been easy for me... until my freshman year of college. After two semesters of terrible grades in the classes required by my major and A's in my electives I was thoroughly lost and in hysterics.

That summer my life changed. I began attending the trial of a prominent Muslim charity that was being accused of funneling money to "terrorist" groups in the Middle East. I listened to the wiretapped phone calls that were collected long before the USA PATRIOT Act was passed, watched videos of performers singing revolutionary songs, and looked at documents that trace millions of dollars to the exact places where the charity claimed the money was sent and all of this was intended to be evidence of the charity's wrongdoing. I was flabbergasted, disgusted, and horrified. After my first day at the trial, I stayed depressed and cried for about a week and then I had the idea of taking action on behalf of these persecuted men, all of whom were Palestinian, being accused of a terrible crime they didn't commit when their only intention was to help the struggling people of the world.

I created a facebook group telling people all about the trial and urging them to come, I sent text messages to everyone in my phone, I emailed all of my contacts, I convinced as many of my friends to attend the trial with me, and when school started again, I got a group of students at my university to attend the trial as well. The trial ended with a hung jury and no guilty verdicts. I was absolutely thrilled, I felt like after everything these men had gone through, they were vindicated. But my life completely changed after this experience. I changed my major to sociology and political science. I thought, if I can better understand the way humans interact and how communities form and our roles in these communities and then apply that knowledge to the politics that run our world, I could fix the terrible things that we as humans create. I wanted to help and protect Muslim-Americans and I wanted to do what I could to make sure being a Palestinian wasn't a crime, not in Palestine or in the U.S.

I wasn't sure what my career aspirations would be, but I knew I eventually wanted to enter into the world of politics. I felt like president was a hefty goal (even though my parents always joked that I would one day fill that office) so I settled for congresswoman. That was seriously my goal. I didn't know what career I wanted to have to prepare me for that position, but I was sure that congress was where I wanted to end up.

I remember once at an MSA (Muslim Student Association) meeting in college we were planning an event about breaking Islamophobic stereotypes and one of our members went on an angry tirade about how Muslims have no right to complain about how badly the media portrays us or how we're underrepresented in Washington because we all choose to dedicate our lives to earning money and prestige, i.e. becoming doctors and engineers. He said we needed people to run for public office and make our presence known and defend our rights. I asked him why he didn't take the political route and why he chose to study business instead, and his exact reply was "it's too late for me, I'm graduating in a semester." I felt like everything he was saying was valid but the fact that he didn't take his opinions seriously enough to reconsider his career path was a little hypocritical and discouraging. I think on some level that short conversation also played a part in helping me decide for certain that I wanted to be a public servant. Then the 2008 election happened.

The 2008 election completely shifted the lens through which I saw my nation. I remember the first time controversy regarding Obama's religion came up; the entire nation acted as if the possibility that he could have been a Muslim or was once a Muslim was the worst quality he could possess. Even worse, he made it a point to continuously and constantly deny being a Muslim as if we were lepers or Satan worshippers or Nazis. The worst insults that right-wing Republicans attempted to shoot at him were that he was a "secret Muslim" and that he once attended an Islamic school in Indonesia. I lost all hope in entering the world of politics. If the Christian son of a Muslim was accused of being the Antichrist, what would the American public call a devout Muslim woman running for office? I had no chance.

My last bit of hope was in Keith Ellison, the first Muslim to be elected to congress. Then the war on Gaza happened and Ellison didn't vote a single time condemning Israel's actions. He abstained from voting each time and I grew more and more disenfranchised and powerless and like I lived on different planet filled with bloodsucking monsters. Only one month after the first election I had the "pleasure" of voting in, I lost all faith in my government and all hope of one day becoming part of this vile institution. I knew my views wouldn't be welcomed and that most certainly the people I would be trying to represent and win their votes would only see me as the embodiment of their misshaped understanding of my faith. I was utterly disappointed and had no idea what I wanted to do with my life.

After that terrible experience, I didn't know what I wanted to dedicate my life to. Not only did I not have an immediate career goal, I now didn't have a long-term goal either. Once my dream of being a politician was completely shot down, I decided that Muslim-Americans would have to save themselves and that my new life's passion was to free Palestine. The next mess I need to sort through is figuring out what kind of career I can take on to assist in my goal of freeing Palestine. Then there's law school, which feels like my impeding doom. It's on the horizon and I'm terrified. Right now I'm not even hoping to be among the top 10%, I'm just praying I don't drop out.. all this and I haven't even started yet. I don't know what fate has in store for me, but I hope with every ounce of my being that it involves the liberation of my homeland and me living in it.

The Roots of Compassion

2011-06-13T16:22:00.001-05:00

Sometimes I wonder what it is that motivates my passion for Palestine. There are a multitude of options that I have come up with including nationalism, responsibility or a sense of duty to my people, guilt for fleeing Palestine, guilt for living a comfortable life I didn't earn, and most recently a strange form of compassion for the suffering that involves just wanting to be among them to console and comfort them.

I remember when I traveled to Gaza with my family in 2004, we had an incredibly difficult time at the border. It was the second intifada, borders opened arbitrarily, and there were daily bombardments in Beit Hanoun and Rafah. We spent three days at the border, our meals consisted of handouts given to us by the International Red Cross, and we slept on the cold tile floor covered with blankets that the Red Cross let us borrow. The food was so unappetizing that upon seeing it, we no longer felt our gut-wrenching hunger. The blankets smelled so terrible that we would only cover up to our waists with them and breathe out of our mouths until we fell asleep. I remember finally feeling like a real Palestinian, like I was suffering for my homeland. I thought, "wow, if this is what it takes just to get into Palestine, imagine what a paradise it is if all of these people are willing to suffer this much to see it." Every miserable moment filled me with hope and excitement. I imagined sweeter air, greener grass, and a brighter sun on the other side of the Rafah border.

Although I was incredibly upbeat about the entire experience, no one else on my family shared my enthusiasm. My brothers kept saying they wanted to go back home if we didn't get in the next day, my dad avoided us completely and randomly yelled at the Egyptian police officers he encountered as he complained to all of the other Palestinian men about how fabulous he was in America, and my mother, she coped with the stress in completely different way. My mother would go out of her way to make sure we had every tiny, minuscule thing we wanted, she held us in her lap and petted our hair, and she constantly told us how much she loved us and how things would soon improve. All of this hanaan, or compassion, was out of the ordinary for us. Our mother was a sweet and kind woman but most of the time we saw her simply as the strict disciplinarian she had proven to be throughout our lives. I was so confused by her changed behavior that I asked her at one point why she was being so nice and she replied solemnly that she felt bad that we were suffering so much in order to visit a place we didn't know and people we didn't remember and that, as our mother, it was her duty to relieve as much of the discomfort we were feeling as she could. As rude and hot-tempered as the Egyptian officials were, she was kind and gentle; as harsh and rough as the Red Cross blankets were, she was soft and comforting; as miserable and bored as we were, she was jovial and upbeat.

My mother's methods of making our suffering easier always intrigued me; is this the differing natures of men and women that I am told about? Is that why my father is yelling at strangers and unable to look any of us in the eye while my mother gives us back rubs and endless hugs? My mother's actions made me feel sorry for her because I knew that she blamed herself for the situation we were in; she was taking us to the place where she was born, where she had grown up, where her family still lived. But I didn't blame her. I saw our border experience as part of the necessary suffering that comes with being Palestinian. God gave us inherent rights to one of the best places he created, to blessed fertile land, the land of figs and olives, milk and honey; it was only fair that we took on a few burdens to earn our right to belong to such a utopian land.

I first noticed my mother's compassion in me after I watched a documentary called "Arna's Children" about a woman, Juliano Mer Khamis' mother, who established a theater for the children of the Jenin refugee camp to productively release their anger and frustration with their environment. Not to give away the ending of this incredible film that everyone must watch, but a lot of the little boys we met at the beginning of the film ended up dying in the armed resistance defending their camp at the end of the film. I felt such deep sorrow for them and their families and all I wanted to do was console them and hold them in my arms and pet their hair and tell them that things would get better soon, tell them that no one suffers unnecessarily, that we are extensions of a beautiful land and that we are integral parts of this land's story, that God rewards the patient, and every other comforting thing I could think of.

Now, I wonder if my compassion for Palestine is rooted in my feminine nature, in my motherly desire to relieve the suffering of those around me because I feel responsible for their pain on some level, like their sorrow is a result of my inability to make the situation they're in better. (In case it is unclear, I am not a mother, but I feel like women have that motherly nature engrained in them.) Either way, I want to make life in Palestine better and whatever motivates me or feeds my passion is an asset and I hope and pray it is unending because this is genuinely my life's passion. I hope law school isn't too much of a drain on my compassion because it seems like lawyers are very low in that important quality that makes us human. Pray I come out of law school with an even deeper engrained passion for Palestinian human rights and international law.

Rafah crossing in 2004, where we lived for three days that summer. The bags on the bottom left corner are the bags of food issued to us by the International Red Cross.

Gaza Story: War Trauma

2011-06-10T02:54:00.003-05:00

I have no knowledge of medicine or psychology, so I don't feel like I'm in a position to diagnose anyone with any disorder, especially one as complex as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). So in this post, I will refer only to "war trauma" and not PTSD. In the U.S., when war related trauma is mentioned, it is only in reference to the terrible consequence of war from which many of our soldiers suffer. Contrastingly, when this type of trauma is mentioned in Palestine, it is almost exclusively used to refer to the effects war has on young children, and that will be the focus of this post.

Before I get to my point, allow me to tell a short story (as is my custom) and promote an incredible film. I recently watched an incredible documentary called "To Shoot an Elephant" (this is a link to part 1 of 17, please make sure you watch the entire film and in order). This is an extraordinary film that was shot by international activists who were in Gaza during Israel's 2008-2009 offensive code named "Operation Cast Lead" that claimed over 1400 Palestinian lives, with over 300 of these lives belonging to children. The film begins with an interview with a family of peasant farmers living in the buffer zone. The family being filmed as well as the film crew realize that the amount of bombardment was far heavier and more intense than an average Gaza day and the crew left to film closer to where the bombardment was focused. They continued to film for the next 22 days capturing important initial moments of the war including markets closing, police headquarters being attacked and scores of civilian policemen being slaughtered, and the disheartening flow of children being wheeled into the hospital. The film also captured evidence of many of the war crimes Israel committed during this massacre including the intended targeting of civilians; bombardment of hospitals, schools, universities, and UN warehouses; the firing of live ammunition on paramedics; and the use of white phosphorous on a civilian population. But, worst of all was the fatalism, incredible fear, and helplessness the people of Gaza felt as their lives were under fire for three weeks. That was my plug for the film, and now I will share my story.

After watching this film, I felt like I had experienced the war on a level so much more substantial than the insight I received from reading books and reports on the war or watching countless hours of news reports. I felt like, in a superficial way, I had lived the war. The next day I went for a walk with my mother through the neighborhood where my family has been living for the past two years. Our neighborhood is very isolated and there isn't much around us but more houses and empty plots of land. As we were walking, I began hearing strange loud sounds that sounded much like gunshots.

I thought I was imagining it because I was still terrified after watching the documentary on the war the day before. I immediately decided that the images I saw of the war had traumatized me and that I was reliving the experiences that brought about my trauma... but the sounds I heard were very real and very close. I looked at my mother with horror in my eyes and panic in my voice, "Do you hear that? It sounds like gunshots! And they're so close!" My mom was confused by my highly emotional tone and answered nonchalantly, "Yeah, I hear it. They are gunshots... at the shooting range near our house." I don't know how the sounds of gunshots had alluded me for two years, but after seeing this film my ears became much more sensitive to the firing of weapons and I became very uncomfortable with the close proximity that this terrifying place had to my house.

Back to the original focus of my post: the ways war traumatizes children.

Although I have not mentioned this in any of my blog posts before, I once lived in the Gaza Strip. When I was two years old, my parents decided they wanted to go "back home" and visit their parents. The year was 1990. They decided to travel to one of the most unstable countries in the most unstable part of the world during the First Intifada and the first Gulf War. Needless to say, our visit turned into a three year stay because traveling across borders became impossible when people were dying on a daily basis.

I was pretty young during these three years, but I do have a few memories of life in Gaza. Most of them are scenes my imagination created after being told stories of things that happened to me while we lived there mixed with dreams I later had about life in Gaza. I remember tanks in the streets, I remember climbing through our neighbor's window to get to our house because the street in front of our house had soldiers, I remember walking to pre-K with my best friend, I remember his sisters getting ready for a wedding, I remember an Israeli soldier on the roof of an apartment building near ours aiming his gun at me when I chanted an intifada slogan at him, and I remember getting that massive scar on my right knee while playing with my brother in the alley beside our house. Even with these distinct memories, there really isn't much I remember because of my young age.

My older brother, who we will call Mu'min for no specific reason, on the other hand had a lot of memories from these three years we spent in Gaza. He went to second, third, and fourth grade in Gaza and boys his age played a major role in the intifada. He was involved in throwing rocks at tanks just like many others like him. But the memories that haunted him were not of tanks navigating the alleys of his refugee camp or the murder of unarmed young men before his eyes; the memories that bore into his subconscious were of soldiers raiding our home and arresting and beating our father.

Even after we left Gaza and moved back to the U.S., Mu'min continued to wet his bed well into his late elementary years. I think he was 12 or 13 before he was able to push past this terrible and embarrassing time in his life. I remember when I was in second grade wondering why I had stopped wetting the bed long ago but my older brother had just recently defeated this monster. I also wondered why his problem was not as common amongst the new children we met as it was amongst our old friends and our cousins back in Gaza. I remember every child we knew in Gaza wet the bed, it was such a common household problem. Most kids stopped before they were ten, so in that way my brother was an anomaly, but this issue remained a prominent one.

I had long forgotten about his ancient problem wetting the bed until it was brought up recently when my family was sitting around discussing my brother's strange sleeping problems. I was very young when we lived in Gaza and was still quite young when we returned to the U.S., so I did not hold on to my memories as well as my brother and I did not remember his night terrors.

Almost every night we were living in Gaza, my brother suffered from terrible night terrors. These weren't just nightmares; he would scream and cry and get out of bed throwing fits of rage as he told stories of the terrible images he was picturing. Most of his nightmares involved either our father being arrested, beaten, and shot by Israeli soldiers or they consisted of masked Hamas gunmen beating him to death in the street (as often happened to men who were discovered to be collaborators with the occupation forces). He would scream, cry, and hit as he wandered around our home hysterical about the realities he was living inside of his head. My mother would take him to our sleeping father and comfort him by proving that he was only dreaming and that our father was safe in bed.

The strangest thing about these terrible nightmares was that they continued even into his adulthood. My mother told us how when Mu'min was in high school she would find him on the couch crying in the middle of the night while he was still sleeping. She would hold his head in her lap and recite Quran to calm him and when he became quiet she would either leave him to sleep on the couch or lead him back to his room. Mu'min mentions how he used to find himself in the living room or in my parents bedroom in the mornings when he distinctly remembers falling asleep in his bedroom. I remember when I was in high school and he was in grad school, we'd stay up late studying for tests or doing homework and he'd fall asleep and oftentimes shake violently or mumble under his breath. It really was quite terrifying. Even now, Mu'min is 27 years old and his wife still tells stories of him murmuring strange and indiscernible things in his sleep or stories of him sleepwalking.

His night terrors have drastically improved since his childhood, and I'm not sure if his present sleep issues relate to the trauma he suffered as a child growing up in Gaza during the First Intifada, but I surely wouldn't be surprised.

During my recent trip to Gaza (November 2010- January 2011), my thirteen year old cousin Shurooq asked me to keep the light on and the door open when she was sleeping over. I asked her if she was scared of the dark and she answered by explaining to me that it wasn't that she's scared of going to sleep in a dark room; she was afraid of waking up in one. She said that ever since the 2008-2009 war on Gaza, she's been unable to sleep in a room by herself or in a room that is dark or in a room with the door closed. Her confession upset me greatly. I was deeply saddened that she and other children in Gaza had to go through such a horrific experience at such a young age and worried that these experiences would live within her for the remainder of her life.

A few months after I returned from Gaza, I wrote a poem answering the shallow and superficial questions people asked me about my visit and I mention this experience with Shurooq. The poem is below:

Gaza

They ask me

wide-eyed

How was it?

Were you scared?

Was it like what we saw

during that month on TV?

(sigh)

It wasn't a vacation

I was there to be one with them

to be one of them

to be one with my land

witness the lives of its people

understand their struggle

engrave their narratives in my soul

let their pain be mine

and for once, really feel

No, I wasn't scared

I've always believed in fate

if it's my time, I'll go

no matter where or who's shooting

or if I'm sleeping or holding a white flag

or eating or celebrating life

or mourning death or simply being

Palestinian and unchosen

No, it's not like what you saw on TV

it's worse.

worse because two years later

nothing has changed

the dead still dead

the grieving still grieving

roads still crushed by tanks

what were once houses

still not again homes

no rebuilding, no replanting

it's the same

but the difference this time

is you don't see it on TV

It's worse, so much worse

now kids can't sleep in rooms alone

Shurooq is thirteen and afraid of the dark

when she wakes up at night

she needs to know someone's close

she still describes with precision

the first bomb

the first missile

the long run home from school

the chaos in the streets

the men screaming for her to hurry

the children so afraid

so terrified they forgot the way home

It's worse, so much worse

the way they talk about death

like it's near and they have no dread

the way they look at life

like it's futile, not worth living

It's worse, so much worse

that they expect another war

but this one more severe

they say none of us will remain

this last one was a test

pushing the limits to see how far

how many of us they could kill

the world answered with apathy

the Arabs watched, sat idle

this time, they'll finish

none of us will be left

and soon not enough living

to pray for the dead

The Soccer Debacle

2011-06-08T03:40:00.001-05:00

So it's the NBA finals right now and Americans are plastered to their TV sets to see Nowitzki and Kidd go against Lebron and Wade. I'm usually very apathetic when it comes to sports, which comes as a surprise to everyone (including myself). I have three brothers and a father whose hearts pump blood that is enriched by sports instead of oxygen. My father's two loves in life are sports and politics and each one of his four children has taken on one of these passions; I was the only one who chose politics.

Oddly enough, the obsession with all things Mavericks and Heat has even captured my attention the past few days. Maybe because I am desperate to bond with my brothers who live hours away most of the year or maybe because I haven't had a car for a month and the house is growing more and more boring, I have watched more basketball the past few days than I have my entire life. And this strange new activity has led me to a strange topic: American arrogance. How does this relate to the NBA Finals in the least bit? You will see.

As I watched game four of the NBA Finals with the men of my household, I remembered.. well, Gaza of course. Everything reminds me of Gaza because, as you well know, I wish I was there this moment and most other moments as well.

I remembered how excited everyone in Gaza grew when Real Madrid played Barcelona. I remember the first time they played when I was in Gaza, it was about two weeks after I had arrived and I hadn't yet gotten used to life in Gaza (not that two months I spent in Gaza made that any more of a reality). I heard gun shots every fifteen minutes or so and I was worried. I thought maybe there was an invasion or a fighting between factions or even a family feud. Whatever it was, it scared me! Then my cousins comforted me by assuring me that nothing "scary" would happen tonight because all of the men of the Gaza Strip were busy-- Real vs. Barca means the streets are empty, work is put on hold, and personal issues frozen in time. But where were these gunshots coming from, I wondered. Then my cousins laughed and told me that people get so excited when their team scores that they celebrate by shooting in the air. I was instantly and thoroughly convinced that Arabs were crazy. That was all it took.

The next morning I found out that just like a person in Gaza must belong to one of the Palestinian political factions, they must also support a soccer team, and in Gaza, your choices were narrow: Real or Barca. Everyone I encountered that day from relatives to friends to co-workers had nothing on their minds but the "match" last night. I quickly learned that if I was going to exist in this enclave, I'd need to learn their ways and take part in their pass times. Unfortunately that didn't happen, but the next time the teams played, I made sure to ask who won and what the final score was so that I had a little to contribute to the conversations around me.

As I began to notice more and more the magnitude of the Gazan obsession with these two soccer teams (and tried to over-analyze the possible factors behind this fanatic and semi-destructive team loyalty), I began to recognize the strange ways in which the U.S. differs from every other country in the world. I remember when the World Cup took place last summer, most Americans cared very little. I recognize that the fact that most games took place in the wee hours of the night, our time, may have had a part to play in their lack of interest but that was a minor detail. The fact of the matter was that soccer, or "football" as the rest of the globe calls it, was not popular in the United States.

That made me wonder, how can the world's most popular sport not have a fan base in the most technologically advanced country in the world? We have the resources to learn about the game and watch it and play it, so why don't we? Then I remembered the reputation Americans have the world over; the reputation of being arrogant.

My brother recently traveled to Germany for absolutely no reason and when he returned he told us how inadequate he felt there. Every other tourist he met while in Germany spoke between three to five languages, but out of his group of American college students he was the only bilingual one (if you consider our weak and unsophisticated grasp of the Arabic language as "proficiency"). Americans travel to foreign countries expecting everyone they encounter to speak English, as if these natives of the land we are visiting owe us a good time in their commercially exploited country.

Basically this blog post will address the different and strange ways I have recognized American arrogance, both in myself and in my general society.

One thing that bothered me terribly while I was in Gaza was how I was unable to effectively discuss temperature, distance, weight, or any other measurement for that matter with others. My use of degrees Fahrenheit, miles, pounds, inches, and yards was totally useless there and I was generally incapable of quickly converting any of those units to metric units in my head. I felt so stupid, so American, and so arrogant. Why does my country have it's own inefficient system of measurements that no one else in the world understands or uses? Why must we hold on to this silly system that does us more harm than good simply because one hundred years ago, people made it up? The only reason I can think of is that we're an arrogant people that care very little about the rest of the world and their ways of life, even when they make more sense then we do.

Another thing that bothered me was how I had no knowledge whatsoever about other currencies. When I was told prices in euros, Egyptian pounds, Jordanian dinars, and (in the beginning) shekels, I needed to have these prices converted to dollars just so I could comprehend their meaning. Why aren't these types of things common knowledge to Americans? As an educated American, I feel like I should know this stuff, but it's no surprise I don't. Even though our economy is in the toilet and our precious greenback is worth so little, we still treat the world economy like it owes us something and the average American doesn't care enough to understand what moneys are used in other nations and their comparative values.

Oh, and apparently everyone in the world writes the date differently than the way we do. Instead of writing the date in our "month, day, year" format, all of the other civilized nations of the world write their dates in the more rational "day, month, year" format. It makes so much more sense; why wouldn't you write the measurements of time in order of length? Because you want the whole world to translate everything you produce from your foolish way of wording and arranging it to their far more logical way.

The first time I realized how arrogantly I had been brought up as an American was when I realized that Asia didn't need to be cut in half on the world map if we just scooted America over to the left where she belongs, by herself. For my 13 years of primary education, it never occurred to me that our maps were drawn in a totally nonsensical way. When I imagined a world map, I always saw the U.S. as the center of the world (a strange concept, huh?). Is it that big of a blow to America's ego that she be pushed aside so that a world map can accurately describe the make up of our planet without Asia looking like it's triple its size? I guess it is.

Also, I felt stupid that I was unable to drive a manual car, but I can't find a way to blame that on my nation of citizenship as of now so I'll just stay quiet about that. But when it comes to football, the metric system, dates, and world maps, America is just arrogant and refuses to see things through the rest of the world's more logical eyes. Soccer may not have to do with logic, but I say we learn to love it just as a way of bonding with our brothers who live so far away. Is that too big of a request for the "greatest country on earth?" I think not (about the greatness and about the bigness of the request).

Semi-related photo:

Extra-curricular soccer at a Khan Yunis boys middle school.

Boys in our refugee camp playing in the alley. In case you're wondering, in Gaza, soccer can only be played barefoot :)

One of my favorite images I captured during my trip; boys playing soccer at sunset in Deir el Balah's refugee camp.