When the Abnormal Becomes Normal

Over nargila last night, I sat with some new friends here in Ramallah. We began talking about checkpoints and the Occupation, and some of the ridiculous situations that happen. My friend Darin told the story that happened to us last weekend when we traveled from Ramallah to Hebron to conduct the impact surveys. Darin holds what people here call a “green card,” which is a Palestinian ID card held in a small green folder. The green cards here are West Bank ID, meaning Darin is not allowed to enter Jerusalem (only 6 miles away) without a difficult to obtain permit. Palestinians who still live in Jerusalem hold “blue cards,” which is still a Palestinian ID but specifies that you live in Jerusalem. Blue card holders are allowed to pass between Jerusalem and Ramallah, but sometimes face problems passing through West Bank checkpoints (ex. Between Ramallah and Nablus). Blue card holders are also able to travel inside Israel to Haifa, the sea, and Tel Aviv, but still do not usually hold Israeli passports.

Last weekend, Darin's green card meant that we should not pass through the Jerusalem checkpoints, which are the fastest route between Ramallah and Hebron. However, my American colleague and I are not able to pass through West Bank checkpoints in an Israeli-licensed vehicle. Basically it meant that we would have had to split into 2 vehicles simply to drive the 1 hour between Ramallah and Hebron (2 Palestinian cities.) Are you seeing the ridiculousness and humiliation of this situation? This is what military occupations do, they make normal life into something unrecognizable.

In the end, we decided to try passing the Jerusalem checkpoints together. Darin was interrogated and we were turned back from the checkpoint. She risked being arrested for even attempting to pass without the “special permission,” because she is Palestinian. It is humiliating and wrong, particularly because I, with my American passport, have much more freedom than she does in her own country and home. We ended up sitting at the checkpoint for half an hour, being asked numerous questions by the Israeli soldiers. We then were denied entry to Jerusalem, and drove another hour to a different checkpoint to pass through.

To return to my original point, over nargila we talked about how this situation in Palestine makes things that shouldn't be normal normal. Being interrogated by soldiers, waiting in line just to drive to the next city, allowing people to speak rudely to you and ask personal questions without protest. I notice it in myself. When I am at the checkpoints, I don't speak back to soldiers or question their rudeness to me. In order to let it pass as quickly as possible, I submit to the occupation's reality, just as people do here. As we spoke about though, it is scary sometimes to realize that you are allowing your basic dignity, self-respect, privacy to be breached without protest. Allowing the abnormal to become normal, and the situation to continue. Something to think about.