Bring Me Solomon's Sword

JERUSALEM - Yesterday I walked through the streets of the Old City of Jerusalem. There are four quarters of the Old City and the Jewish quarter was largely closed because of Shabbat. It was interesting to see the Wailing Wall so packed out. I also found it interesting that on a normal day you may take pictures of the persons praying at the Wailing Wall but you cannot during Shabbat.

It is difficult to see why people are so fanatical about this piece of land now that I am here. The history is wonderful, but for the large part both sides live in the more modern New City of Jerusalem which lies on the outside of the Old City. You can actually see the bullet holes around Zion Gate.

I am struck by the ridiculousness of fighting over such land. With the exception of the few remaining Bedouin farmers and various shepherds, almost none of the people involved in this conflict do anything with the land. Not only do they not do anything with the land, everything they do to it is vile and disrespectful. There are stray plastic bottles, bags, and other pollution along the streets in the West Bank. The Israeli's build their settlements on the tops of hills, having chopped down forests for their sprawl and land confiscation attempts. Not to mention how the need for water on both sides has decimated aquifers, with the Israeli settlers washing cars and watering gardens while the Palestinians are charged more and rationed.

Everything here is a game to humiliate or burden the other side. In Jordan we heard stories of Israeli tourists who would leave the taps running in their hotels upon checkout just to screw the Jordanian's water situation. The exposed water pipes all over Israel Proper are surrounded by fences for paranoia of attacks on the water sources. The Israeli tours tell the people not to drink the Palestinian waters because they might be full of poison.

This is what made the Old City so special. Today while I wandered around the New City I cannot but feel a certain apprehension whenever a bus passes by or I stand in a busy part of town - and there has been no attack in approximately a year and a half. Still, there has never been a major bombing in the Old City. Arab and Jew sell their wares in quarters surrounded by the same city walls. You cross one street and you can literally feel the cultural jump. Still, there are no hostilities. People here seem to be able to live with each other, perhaps because they have no other choice in such tight quarters. And this, ironically, is the city the conflict ultimately boils down to. Perhaps it should become a nation unto itself, a Vatican if you will.

Like the two women fighting over the baby before King Solomon, if this conflict cannot be solved we should threaten to cut it in half. The one who agrees does not love it. If neither of them agree, they both love it. They have both shown they love it by not attacking the insides, by living in harmony, and so the only solution seems to take it from both and give it to the dwellers inside. Let them have the land on the outside, promise the land inside to the one who promised it to others.

Contact Kevin at kevin.ressler@emu.edu