Kansas Citian serves in Holy Land
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Andrea Whitmore
Dec 18, 2007, 10:34:42 AM12/18/07
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Dear Friends of Peace,
Here's a bit of news from my husband Doug, taken from the few emails he's been able to send so far. There won't be many, I think--as you'll see if you read what follows. For anyone who may not know what he's doing, he's serving as an Ecumenical Accompanier (EA) in the Holy Land until early March. It's a program of the World Council of Churches. He was in Washington DC for a week before leaving, and while there met with many groups including representatives from the United Methodist Board of Church and Society (we are United Methodists). According to the list sent to me, he also met with the Jewish peace group Brit Tzedek vShalom, Churches for Middle East Peace, The American Task Force on Palestine, and quite a few others.
Doug's assignment is to be in Jayyous, which is near Qalqilya. I've put links to maps and information at the end of these excerpts.
I hope the time jumps aren't too confusing in the following! Andy
DEC 8
...Tomorrow after church we are picked up by the old EA's and taken to our locations for two or three days of orientation. Then we come back to Jerusalem to finish the week training here. There are maybe five other men, all but two older like me, and seven to nine women of various ages. Everyone is very nice including the staff.
My roommate in Jerusalem will be a young black man from South Africa when he gets here. He is the only one who was detained by immigration and was held in prison last night. Just when it looked like he would be sent home, a Bishop intervened and managed to have him released to us. Should meet him soon....
DEC 12
Hi Dear, its about 2:30 wed pm. My team , 3 of us, just arrived back in Jerusalem after 3 days at Jayyous.
It was an intro and in a few minutes we meet with Valentina and Pauline (in the World Council of Churches office) for an hour to discuss the location.
Naturally the internet connection at the Jayyous house was out. Supposed to be fixed shortly but wouldn't bet on it.
There is an internet cafe, ha, with about one computer for the internet. If we have to we can use that.
All is going well. The old team will be in Jayyous until Mon.
My teammates are two young women--Jenny from German part of Switzerland and Zaga from Germany whose parents came from Eritrea in vicinity of Somalia and Sudan.
Jenny was an EA a year ago and volunteered to come back when they needed someone this year.
Zaga is educated in linguistics and conflict resolution. We get along well in what is kind of a father-
daughter and colleague relationship. All the EA teams are here until Tues for more training.
Then we take the van and bus transport back to Jayyous where we monitor 3 agriculture gates.
Also we monitor Qalqilya North terminal for pedestrians and a checkpoint for vehicles nearby.
There are a number of small villages we are to visit and make contacts so they'll call if they think we can help them.
The only really tough part is getting up at 3:00 or 3:30 AM to take a taxi to the Qalqilya points
so we'll be there when they open at 4:00 AM. Only need to get up at 5:00 AM for the agricultural gates
near Jayyous.
DEC 13
...Today was all classroom lectures and discussions about what is expected of us and how we are to handle various situations. Tomorrow is more of the same but it is interesting. They stress that while we are expected to talk to soldiers and sometimes settlers on behalf of Palestinians we are not to get ourselves arrested or hurt. Of course we will also be in touch with Israeli peace groups such as Machsom Watch and accompanying them and attending their demonstrations, etc...
DEC 14
Today we had a class from a lady in an Israeli watch group. She was very experienced and filled us in on a lot. Also had about a 45 minute Hebrew lesson with the key words and phrases, which we also have copies.
DEC 15
...This morning, Sat, all the EAs went to Bethlehem for classes. One was given by a Palestinian man in mid thirties about nonviolence. Mainly he taught how complex it is because everyone has his own idea of what is violence or nonviolence. He demonstrated this by describing scenarios and having us each position ourselves on a spectrum that he drew on the floor. It all depended on a person's background and experience as to how she viewed situations.
We had an hour's break after lunch, and then we had an hour and a half of Arabic. Palestinian language is similar to what we learned (NOTE: Doug and I took elementary Arabic at Village Presbyterian Church this fall, at their Village U--very good) but has a lot of differences too.
Some of the EAs went to a birthday party given by a young woman in the prior group but I declined. Too much work relating to people my age I don't know very well and to others younger than our kids. I'm content to write you and go out for some kind of falafel after awhile. This Gloria Hotel is in the Old City just inside the Jaffe Gate, which opens into the Christian Quarter. Perhaps a few blocks away is a kind of Pal. market with a variety of shops and food stands. There are plenty of police keeping an eye on things, though everyone minds his own business and doesn't bother anyone else.
Tomorrow morning I'll find a Christian church nearby here in the quarter. In the afternoon we have a couple of classes which could go for three or four hours.
Anyway, it won't be long until Tues morning when ICAHD's Angela Godfrey (NOTE: Icahd is the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions. Its chair, Jeff Halper, nominated in 2006 for a Nobel Peace Prize, has spoken at Broadway United Methodist in Kansas City, our church) gives us a tour of the Jerusalem occupation issues and then we leave for the placements. Janoun and Hebron definitely sound like the toughest places to be so guess I feel fortunate.
DEC 17
We just had the handover ceremony in the Lutheran Church from the old group to our new group. Both will have dinner together at the Jerusalem Hotel at 7:00. The old group at the placement says the wifi there is now working. Great News!
From Andy, some links:
http://www.un.org/unrwa/emergency/barrier/profiles/jayous.html (map of Jayyous, near Qalqilya, and information about the village and its history provided by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency--UNRWA)
http://www.btselem.org/English/Maps/Index.asp (this is an Israeli peace group that monitors abuses by both sides. This link is to a map that shows Jayyous (middle, very top). The red line is the "wall" and the green line is the internationally recognized border, the one the Palestinians have agreed to accept but that obviously the Israeli gov't hasn't (you'll have noticed the tremendous difference between the very active Israeli peace groups versus the government, military, and settlers). Inside the green line (the West Bank and Gaza) represents just 22% of historic Palestine. The Palestinians have agreed to accept this, but Israeli settlements, paid for in large part by U.S. taxes, continue to confiscate this, the remaining 22% of Palestinian land.
http://www.gush-shalom.org/thewall/index.html Gush Shalom (translates to "peace block") is an Israeli group working for coexistence between Israelis and Palestinians. This link is a larger map that shows how far Jayyous--which is near Qalqilya--is from Jerusalem and Bethlehem.
That's it for awhile. I don't know how often I'll hear from Doug once he's in the village, despite the possible wifi. He'll be exhausted, it sounds like, so even when he can get internet access he'll likely be brief. He said they're to take naps after their middle-of-the-night duty, then go teach English in Jayyous and be available for any assistance needed, such as if there's an Israeli military incursion or settlers harassing farmers, shepherds, children. But I'll send news when I get it, unless you ask me not to. Thanks, everyone, for your loving support. Andrea PS--I mentioned the Arabic classes we took before Doug left. In addition, he also took a four-month class in the basics of Judaism at a KC synagogue this fall.
Here's a bit of news from my husband Doug, taken from the few emails he's been able to send so far. There won't be many, I think--as you'll see if you read what follows. For anyone who may not know what he's doing, he's serving as an Ecumenical Accompanier (EA) in the Holy Land until early March. It's a program of the World Council of Churches. He was in Washington DC for a week before leaving, and while there met with many groups including representatives from the United Methodist Board of Church and Society (we are United Methodists). According to the list sent to me, he also met with the Jewish peace group Brit Tzedek vShalom, Churches for Middle East Peace, The American Task Force on Palestine, and quite a few others.
Doug's assignment is to be in Jayyous, which is near Qalqilya. I've put links to maps and information at the end of these excerpts.
I hope the time jumps aren't too confusing in the following! Andy
DEC 8
...Tomorrow after church we are picked up by the old EA's and taken to our locations for two or three days of orientation. Then we come back to Jerusalem to finish the week training here. There are maybe five other men, all but two older like me, and seven to nine women of various ages. Everyone is very nice including the staff.
My roommate in Jerusalem will be a young black man from South Africa when he gets here. He is the only one who was detained by immigration and was held in prison last night. Just when it looked like he would be sent home, a Bishop intervened and managed to have him released to us. Should meet him soon....
DEC 12
Hi Dear, its about 2:30 wed pm. My team , 3 of us, just arrived back in Jerusalem after 3 days at Jayyous.
It was an intro and in a few minutes we meet with Valentina and Pauline (in the World Council of Churches office) for an hour to discuss the location.
Naturally the internet connection at the Jayyous house was out. Supposed to be fixed shortly but wouldn't bet on it.
There is an internet cafe, ha, with about one computer for the internet. If we have to we can use that.
All is going well. The old team will be in Jayyous until Mon.
My teammates are two young women--Jenny from German part of Switzerland and Zaga from Germany whose parents came from Eritrea in vicinity of Somalia and Sudan.
Jenny was an EA a year ago and volunteered to come back when they needed someone this year.
Zaga is educated in linguistics and conflict resolution. We get along well in what is kind of a father-
daughter and colleague relationship. All the EA teams are here until Tues for more training.
Then we take the van and bus transport back to Jayyous where we monitor 3 agriculture gates.
Also we monitor Qalqilya North terminal for pedestrians and a checkpoint for vehicles nearby.
There are a number of small villages we are to visit and make contacts so they'll call if they think we can help them.
The only really tough part is getting up at 3:00 or 3:30 AM to take a taxi to the Qalqilya points
so we'll be there when they open at 4:00 AM. Only need to get up at 5:00 AM for the agricultural gates
near Jayyous.
DEC 13
...Today was all classroom lectures and discussions about what is expected of us and how we are to handle various situations. Tomorrow is more of the same but it is interesting. They stress that while we are expected to talk to soldiers and sometimes settlers on behalf of Palestinians we are not to get ourselves arrested or hurt. Of course we will also be in touch with Israeli peace groups such as Machsom Watch and accompanying them and attending their demonstrations, etc...
DEC 14
Today we had a class from a lady in an Israeli watch group. She was very experienced and filled us in on a lot. Also had about a 45 minute Hebrew lesson with the key words and phrases, which we also have copies.
DEC 15
...This morning, Sat, all the EAs went to Bethlehem for classes. One was given by a Palestinian man in mid thirties about nonviolence. Mainly he taught how complex it is because everyone has his own idea of what is violence or nonviolence. He demonstrated this by describing scenarios and having us each position ourselves on a spectrum that he drew on the floor. It all depended on a person's background and experience as to how she viewed situations.
We had an hour's break after lunch, and then we had an hour and a half of Arabic. Palestinian language is similar to what we learned (NOTE: Doug and I took elementary Arabic at Village Presbyterian Church this fall, at their Village U--very good) but has a lot of differences too.
Some of the EAs went to a birthday party given by a young woman in the prior group but I declined. Too much work relating to people my age I don't know very well and to others younger than our kids. I'm content to write you and go out for some kind of falafel after awhile. This Gloria Hotel is in the Old City just inside the Jaffe Gate, which opens into the Christian Quarter. Perhaps a few blocks away is a kind of Pal. market with a variety of shops and food stands. There are plenty of police keeping an eye on things, though everyone minds his own business and doesn't bother anyone else.
Tomorrow morning I'll find a Christian church nearby here in the quarter. In the afternoon we have a couple of classes which could go for three or four hours.
Anyway, it won't be long until Tues morning when ICAHD's Angela Godfrey (NOTE: Icahd is the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions. Its chair, Jeff Halper, nominated in 2006 for a Nobel Peace Prize, has spoken at Broadway United Methodist in Kansas City, our church) gives us a tour of the Jerusalem occupation issues and then we leave for the placements. Janoun and Hebron definitely sound like the toughest places to be so guess I feel fortunate.
DEC 17
We just had the handover ceremony in the Lutheran Church from the old group to our new group. Both will have dinner together at the Jerusalem Hotel at 7:00. The old group at the placement says the wifi there is now working. Great News!
From Andy, some links:
http://www.un.org/unrwa/emergency/barrier/profiles/jayous.html (map of Jayyous, near Qalqilya, and information about the village and its history provided by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency--UNRWA)
http://www.btselem.org/English/Maps/Index.asp (this is an Israeli peace group that monitors abuses by both sides. This link is to a map that shows Jayyous (middle, very top). The red line is the "wall" and the green line is the internationally recognized border, the one the Palestinians have agreed to accept but that obviously the Israeli gov't hasn't (you'll have noticed the tremendous difference between the very active Israeli peace groups versus the government, military, and settlers). Inside the green line (the West Bank and Gaza) represents just 22% of historic Palestine. The Palestinians have agreed to accept this, but Israeli settlements, paid for in large part by U.S. taxes, continue to confiscate this, the remaining 22% of Palestinian land.
http://www.gush-shalom.org/thewall/index.html Gush Shalom (translates to "peace block") is an Israeli group working for coexistence between Israelis and Palestinians. This link is a larger map that shows how far Jayyous--which is near Qalqilya--is from Jerusalem and Bethlehem.
That's it for awhile. I don't know how often I'll hear from Doug once he's in the village, despite the possible wifi. He'll be exhausted, it sounds like, so even when he can get internet access he'll likely be brief. He said they're to take naps after their middle-of-the-night duty, then go teach English in Jayyous and be available for any assistance needed, such as if there's an Israeli military incursion or settlers harassing farmers, shepherds, children. But I'll send news when I get it, unless you ask me not to. Thanks, everyone, for your loving support. Andrea PS--I mentioned the Arabic classes we took before Doug left. In addition, he also took a four-month class in the basics of Judaism at a KC synagogue this fall.
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