Israel and Palestine – My Complex Experience

Photo by the author

by Chris Orrey (10 Minute Read)

Religion and spirituality have always fascinated me. A seed was planted when I read Elizabeth Gilbert’s Eat, Pray, Love. Wouldn’t it be wonderful, I thought, to experience various religions of the world and write about it? As my 2014 retirement approached, the idea was watered and fertilized and grew. I decided to immerse myself in five of the major religions of the world one year at a time. I chose to begin with the three Western religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam, and to end with Hinduism then Buddhism. It was as far as I could get from the thirty years I spent as a lesbian in the hetero-normative, male dominated field of policing.

When I saw a rainbow pride flag and Black Lives Matter sign outside of Kehilla Synagogue in the San Francisco Bay Area, I knew I was in a safe space. I attended services there, studied Torah, took Hebrew classes, and restricted the forbidden foods of pork and shellfish from my diet. I studied the Jewish culture and the religion of Judaism by any means I could find. Documentaries, cultural events, museums, conversations with Jewish friends and family, Jewish diners, Passover Seders, lectures; I was open to anything I could absorb to gain an understanding of what was so unknown to me.

Even before the year began, I knew I was going to travel to Israel as a capstone of my experiences. What better way to experience Judaism than to travel to the land of the Israelites written about in the Hebrew Bible, to the country that has the highest population of Jewish people in the world?

I could not find a synagogue or rabbi to join on such a trip in the timeframe that worked for me, so I explored secular options. I found a U.S.-based secular travel company that offered a two-week trip to “The Holy Land.” I was pleased to find that the trip included explorations of many holy sites revered by Christianity and Islam, as well. I booked the trip early on in my year of all things Jewish, counting the months, then weeks, then days until I flew halfway across the world to Israel.

Prior to my trip, I had a helpful conversation with Rabbi Dev, Kehilla’s senior rabbi, about my trip. Kehilla is a social justice-oriented synagogue that believes that the Israeli government is an occupying force in Palestine. Rabbi Dev recommended a book, The Lemon Tree by Sandy Tolan, which opened my eyes and my heart to the challenges of peace in the Middle East. That book would prove to be very important as I strived to understand not just the Jewish perspective in the land to where I was travelling, but the perspective of all who call the land home.

I landed in Tel Aviv and was greeted by Joan, our tour director. I would soon learn that Joan, who called herself our Israeli mom, would handle all of our travel details. That evening our group of twenty-three adventurers from the United States and Canada met each other as well as our tour educator, Avram. While Joan’s donning of pants and an uncovered head did not suggest her religious orientation, Avram’s kippot and tallit displayed his Orthodox Jewish faith. Avram and Joan introduced themselves and shared that they had both been raised in the U.S., but made Aliyah to Israel as young adults, living in Jerusalem for decades. They have both strictly adhered to their Orthodox faith their entire life.

Jerusalem was everything I expected, but so much more. I expected to see Hassidic Ultra-Orthodox Jews wearing black hats and wigs. I expected kosher food and societal adherence to Shabbat. I expected a sea of men wearing a kippot and women dressed conservatively. I did not expect a woman wearing an Israeli flag singing and dancing and chanting “Trump is great” and declaring President Obama an anti-Semite when she found out I was American. I did not expect kosher McDonald’s. I did not expect the same political divide in Israel as we now experience in the USA.

I expected a police presence with officers and soldiers slinging rifles over their shoulders. I did not expect waiters openly carrying loaded pistols in their waistband. I expected an air of Holiness. Jerusalem is called the Holy Land, after all. I anticipated a delicate balance of the three Abrahamic religions. I did not expect our tour to be so heavily presented from the Orthodox Jewish perspective. While we did hear from Christian speakers, we only once heard from an Arab speaker, a Palestinian journalist who presented a pro-Israeli point of view. Even the Imam who introduced us to his mosque and the Islamic faith was East Indian, not Arab, the primary race of the Muslim people. I expected a fourteen-foot separation wall between Jerusalem and the West Bank, but I did not expect the Palestinian people to be so oppressed by the Israeli government. I certainly did not expect West Jerusalem to be so much cleaner than East Jerusalem, which has a majority Arab population. Trash and graffiti littering the streets was an obvious indicator that our tour bus had left West Jerusalem. I asked Avram about this and he told me that Arab people are very clean in their homes but not so clean outside their homes. Having spent much time with friends of Arab descent, I did not accept this stereotype. I had quickly developed much respect for Avram’s knowledge and general fairness in his presentations of the history of the land and its people, so I was taken aback with his response. I asked Avram if the citizens of East and West Jerusalem pay equal taxes and receive equal municipal services. Avram paused then admitted that residents do pay taxes in East Jerusalem, yet they do not receive the same municipal services.

One thing all people of Israel and Palestine can agree upon is the food. I expected the food to be good, but I did not expect the hummus to taste so divine. Why would ground garbanzo beans taste so much better in Israel or Palestine than in America?

Walking in the steps of Jesus and Abraham and Mohammed was surreal. Coming from the United States, a country that is 241-years-old, makes for immense awe when looking at the remains of buildings that are thousands of years old. It was difficult to wrap my head around the fact that I was walking on sites that were written about in the Bible and the Quran. Being a novice student of religion, it felt dreamlike to stand on the grounds known to Jews as the Temple Mount, and to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary. Walking about the holiest site to Jews, the third holiest site to Muslims, and the place where Jesus taught and prayed is not something that I could easily absorb.

On the first Shabbat of our trip, Avram’s wife and Joan’s husband joined us for a celebratory Shabbat meal in our hotel dining room. Avram’s wife arrived with head covered and eyes diverted. We learned from Joan that Avram and his wife have eight children. Joan explained that large families are common with descendants of Holocaust survivors. Avram’s wife didn’t speak at all to our tour group during Shabbat dinner. Yet Joan’s formidable husband, Stan, gave an extensive explanation of the value of Shabbat before leading the prayer of blessing for the meal. Stan spoke to us as a group. Our group wasn’t provided the name of Avram’s wife. Was Joan an outlier? Was Avram’s wife to stay behind the scenes while Joan’s husband took a lead role in our education and experience? Or was it just my perspective as a feminist? Spending two weeks with Avram was a gift. I just wished I could talk with his wife, as well. She seemed so different from Joan.

Israel is a land of contradictions. It has a great deal of secular equality. Women are drafted into the military along with men. Yet women rabbis are condemned by the Chief Rabbinate, which controls all things religious. Same-sex marriage is not allowed by the Rabbinate, although the Israeli government will honor the same-sex marriages of its citizens if they are performed lawfully in another country.

The government of Israel is all about its people; its Jewish people, that is. Jews from all over the world are welcome to make Aliyah to Israel and become an Israeli citizen. We even visited with an Ethiopian woman who walked with her family through Ethiopia and Syria before being rescued by the Israeli government and relocated into a Jewish settlement. Yet the Palestinian people, many of whom were expelled from their homes in Jerusalem during the War of Independence in 1948 and further expelled from East Jerusalem during the Six-Day War in 1967, are not allowed to travel into Jerusalem without a work permit, which are very difficult to obtain. Palestinians in the West Bank have a fourteen-foot separation wall dividing them from Jerusalem, built by the Israeli government in response to intifadas by the Palestinians that left over a thousand Israelis dead. I understood why the Israeli government built the wall to protect its people. I didn’t understand why in some places they built the wall eight miles into Palestinian territory, creating a land grab in which Palestinians had no recourse. I didn’t understand why the wall cut through Palestinian neighborhoods, creating the demolition of Palestinian homes and an hour-long drive and long delays in security checkpoints for people who were once neighbors to visit one another.

Many weeks before my tour of Israel, I realized that I would be going all the way to Israel without seeing Bethlehem, which is in the West Bank. The U.S. State Department advises against travelling to the West Bank and Gaza for reasons of safety, yet thousands of Christians travel to Bethlehem every year to visit the birthplace of Jesus. I had also learned quite a bit about the plight of the Palestinians, primarily from the members of Kehilla Synagogue. After reading The Lemon Tree, I had a strong compulsion to find my way into the West Bank to see the complexities for myself. Whether serendipitous or just plain luck, I found another company that took tourists into the West Bank and provided a Palestinian perspective. Three of my travel companions, a couple named Pat and Will and a solo traveler named Ann, learned of my side trip into the West Bank and decided to join me.

As we walked along the separation wall with our Palestinian tour guide, I felt deeply saddened. The graffiti on the Palestinian side of the wall was a constant reminder of the frustrations felt by its people, who had no army to fight back against Israeli oppression or to protect its citizens and their homes. I thought often of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Despite his stance of non-violent resistance, he understood why an oppressed people would respond with violence. And for the first time in my life, I did, too. It was a moment of truth for me. As a cop, I could only see the destruction, injuries and lives lost by violent protest. As I strove to understand the plight of an oppressed people in a way I never had before, I got it. Not only did I get the frustrations of the Palestinian people, I got Black Lives Matter. I got Colin Kaepernick. And I got why some people don’t get it. The Jewish government of Israel, with their holocaust history looming over them like a thick fog, can only see the need to protect their people at all costs. They can’t see that they have become the oppressors. Most cops don’t see it either.

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A riot is the language of the unheard. – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

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There were many moments in Israel that brought pure joy. Floating in the thick minerals of the Dead Sea created a sense of wellness my body hadn’t experienced in many years. Meeting the Kabbalistic artist David Friedman and purchasing a piece of his art for my beloved Kehilla Synagogue back home would show my gratitude for all they had taught me this past year. Straying away from our tour group to speak with the Arab store owner across the way not only gave me happiness, it also left me with a gift put into my hand with a refusal for payment: olive wood prayer beads with “Nazareth” burned into a cross. Meeting fellow travelers who also struggled with the plight of the Palestinians, understood and valued the Jewish will to survive, and hoped for a world in which all people, even gays and lesbians such as myself, would be treated equally buoyed me in the face of the all-too-familiar bigotry to come.

After touring the religious sites of Jerusalem and hearing primarily from our highly educated and politically considerate tour guide and a smattering of Jewish speakers, I was looking forward to touring a mosque in Haifa and hearing from a Muslim Imam.

Mohad greeted us warmly and invited us into his mosque, which was well lit and empty of worshippers. He took off his shoes and stepped onto the carpet that covered the entire floor of the gymnasium-sized mosque. He showed us how Muslims prepare to pray, facing Mecca in Saudi Arabia, touching his ears, then going to the floor in what I know as child’s pose in yoga. As he showed us the position of prostration and prayer, I felt honored to be in his presence. He had invited a group of Americans, from a country that had so much anti-Islam bias, into his sanctuary.

Mohad then took us outside the mosque and to a large library to tell us about his beloved Islam. He told us that the Quran spoke of peace and love and that Islam was a religion of tolerance. Mohad seemed to be stuck on that theme, forgetting that he was to provide an overview of the tenets of his faith. At Avram’s prompting, Mohad taught us about his religion’s customs, the times of the calls to prayer and the five pillars of Islam: faith, prayer, charity, fasting and pilgrimage to Mecca.

When Mohad invited us to ask questions, the sheer volume of my questions kept me mute. How could I choose just one? Since I intended to later devote a year to the study of Islam, I surrendered to the questions of my fellow travelers. How are women treated? What if you are working during prayer times? Are men and women separated in the mosque? Why?

Pat and Will were sitting just to my right. Pat and I had engaged in a conversation a few days prior about the Baha’i Faith and their take on homosexuality. Pat was shocked to learn that the Baha’i, who have a basic tenet of Universal peace, are against homosexuality and same-sex marriage. I shared with Pat my own sexual orientation and an experience I had many years prior. I had been thoroughly enjoying talking with members of Baha’i at a community festival booth in my hometown. When I asked about their stance on homosexuality and gay rights, they shut the door on my interest with their answer. The Baha’i believe that sexual relations should only be within the confines of a marriage between a man and a woman. Pat’s brother is gay, so it should not have been a surprise to me when she asked Mohad if his mosque performs same-sex weddings, yet it was. Mohad’s face went from open and kind to appalled and defensive. “Oh, no! We will not be made to do that.”

My heart sunk and my chest froze. Not in disappointment or surprise. I knew very well that Islam does not support the rights of the queer community. It was the juxtaposition that hit me so hard. Here was this man being an ambassador of his beloved religion that had been so maligned by so many, halting his expressions of love toward his non-Muslim brothers and sisters when asked about gays and lesbians. My mind raced. I should walk out. I should make a stand. I should tell him who I am so he re-thinks his response next time. I should, I should, I should; but I didn’t move a muscle. It was all I could do to contain my hurt, my anger, and my frustration. But contain it I did. Nobody knew how I felt. And nobody cared to ask; not even Pat.

When we got back onto our tour bus I was grateful for the row of tandem seats I had to myself. With my Tilley travel hat and Maui Jim sunglasses hiding my face, nobody could see the anguish I felt. We drove to the Baha’i Gardens to take pictures. While it wasn’t an official stop on our tour, the Baha’i Gardens are a gorgeous tourist spot in Haifa. I didn’t go inside the gates, my silent protest on behalf of my queer brothers and sisters, but the beauty wasn’t lost on me: it was more beauty representing a faith that didn’t want me as I am.

After our stop at the Gardens, Pat engaged Avram in a conversation about the acceptance of gays and lesbians in various faiths. It was clear to me that she had not perceived my emotional response to the anti-gay bias reiterated to me at the mosque. She asked Avram about Orthodox Judaism, of which he was strictly devout. I had not come out to Avram as I did with some others in the group and I will likely never know if he knew I was gay when he replied simply, “The Torah says it is an abomination.”

It was this thought that echoed in my mind the rest of the evening: Why? Why am I so determined to understand these religions that do not accept me as I am?

 

The next day I woke up and realized my body had finally succumbed to the terrible cold working its way through our group. Tissue and a steady stream of beverages got me through the next two days, but on the last full day of our tour I could barely get out of bed. I passed on the walking tour of Tel Aviv. The next day I took a taxi to the only pharmacy in Tel Aviv open on Shabbat and obtained a decongestant for the flight home. I was physically sick, emotionally drained, and terribly homesick. It took much effort to pack and get to the car waiting to take me and another Californian from our group to the airport for our red-eye flight to the East Coast. It was an excruciatingly long twenty-four hours of travel. Finally, I stood at the curb of the San Francisco airport as my beloved Cynthia pulled up to get me. As soon as she rushed out of the Highlander and wrapped her arms around me, my tears broke through the silent dam I had built. As my tears fell onto her shoulder, I sobbed in her arms, relieved to be home where I belong.

 

Note: Some names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals. Future essays will further highlight the complexity of my experiences in the Holy Land; some troubling, many illuminating and wonderful.