IT'S GOOD TO BE A CANADIAN, EH?

Since I’ve arrived here, I’m constantly reminded of how lucky I am to be a Canadian. Even when I experience frustrations with what I see and hear, I know that I still get better treatment and can always go back home whenever I want. I keep wondering how I would feel and react had I and my family, going back decades, experienced what Palestinians have and continue to experience daily.

As we all know, there are many inequalities in Canada; not all Canadians think and feel the same about issues. We have too much poverty, considering the wealth of our country, and many other inequities that we should be ashamed of. However, even those things do not take away our freedom of movement.

Let me give a few examples of situations we don’t have to face:

I can walk, drive, or take a bus from Kitchener to Cambridge for any reason any time I want regardless of my age, race, creed, or colour. Both places are in my country and so I don’t need a passport, or visa, or any document (other than my driver’s license if I’m driving my car). Compare this with 2 situations I know of personally here:

1) A teacher is required by her school board to attend a workshop. She lives in Ramallah; the workshop is in Bethlehem. Both Ramallah and Bethlehem are in the West Bank, Palestinian territory. She, a Palestinian who was born and lives in Ramallah; however, she has Israeli papers due to her parents’ designation when Arabs were allowed to have Israeli citizenship—even though they don’t have the same rights as Jewish citizens, although that’s another issue. She is not allowed to cross the Bethlehem checkpoint to get to her workshop because Israeli citizens are not allowed to cross into the West Bank. (However, Palestinian land is grabbed for illegal settlements in the West Bank, and Israelis can live there and travel through Palestinian land on special roads built only for Israelis; Palestinians are not allowed on these roads.) The only way she can attend her workshop is to be smuggled in illegally, running the risk of repercussions.

2) A grandmother and mother who live in Bethlehem wish to attend a graduation ceremony for their son in East Jerusalem. They, for reasons unknown to them, have been refused the permits they need to cross the Bethlehem checkpoint. The only way they can do that is if someone smuggles them in illegally, running the risk of repercussions.

I live in Kitchener and have a job in Guelph. I can take a bus, taxi, or drive my own car regardless of my age, race, creed, or colour, any time I want in order to get to work on time. Weather, accidents, car or bus breakdowns could make me late, but I can usually make the trip in well under an hour. Compare this with 2 situations I know of personally here:

1) I live in Bethlehem and work in East Jerusalem where I’ve worked for years before the Wall was built. Every singe day that I go to work, in order to get through the checkpoint, I have to be there by 3:00 a.m. and wait hours to be inspected. I have to take off my belt, shoes, coat and anything else that I’m often unceremoniously screamed at by young 18/19-year-old soldiers to do. If I’m carrying anything else, it also goes through the scanner. I have to renew my papers every three months but sometimes something shows up on my papers of which I’m not told, and I’m not allowed through the checkpoint. When I return from work, I go through the checkpoint again to get back home. If nothing else, it’s frustrating, exhausting and humiliating.

2) I live in a village south of Bethlehem and work at Augusta Victoria Hospital. I have a university degree and a very responsible job. Although I’m less than an hour away by car or bus if there were no checkpoint, I have to live in a residence at the hospital because it would be impossible for me to get through the checkpoint each day to get to work on time and still have time to sleep at night or have any quality of life. I go home to visit my family on weekends. My work permit must be renewed every three months; however, I have just been refused a renewal. I don’t know why. No one will tell me. I’ve done nothing that I’m aware of that could have caused my permit not to be renewed. Now, if I go home to visit my family, I will not be allowed back through the checkpoint and therefore will no longer be able to work at the hospital.

These situations are not fictional or hypothetical. They are representative of hundreds of identical or similar situations.

The Israeli will say, “We have to do this to protect ourselves!” “Since we put up the Wall, there have been fewer suicide bombers!”

First of all, as the Wall is not yet completed, there are many spots where a determined suicide bomber could easily get through if he/she wanted. The decline has been due to policy by the extremists to give peace efforts a chance. Have negotiations done anything at all to change things that affect the daily lives of Palestinians? Absolutely not!

If the Palestinians were given equal rights, if instead of Israel’s doing its best to keep its citizens from getting to know Palestinians personally, if the Israelis stopped their land grab—enclosing the best fertile land and water sources within their side of the Wall and then turning around and restricting the amount of water they control back to the Palestinians, if these and all the other inequities were rectified, would there be any appeal for young folks to give up their lives for a cause?

Walking through the Bethlehem checkpoint four times a week, makes my blood boil when I see what humiliations some people face, and the equally infuriating way I and other internationals are allowed to jump the queue or are told to “have a nice day” after a Palestinian has just been humiliated and screamed at. (Although I have been screamed once or twice!) If I were young and had to look forward to facing this, in addition to all the other inequities, every day of my life, how would I feel? What would I do?

BUT I, OR MY FAMILY OR FRIENDS, DON’T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT IT. I’M A CANADIAN, EH?