{"id":13132,"date":"2011-04-01T19:28:44","date_gmt":"2011-04-02T00:28:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/?p=13132"},"modified":"2011-04-01T19:32:47","modified_gmt":"2011-04-02T00:32:47","slug":"israel-reflections-lessons-the-cycle-of-violence-fear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/2011\/04\/israel-reflections-lessons-the-cycle-of-violence-fear\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel Reflections & Lessons: The Cycle of Violence & Fear"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the next few days, I will\u00a0post several blogs compiled of postings from my students who were asked this week to reflect on what they learned from the trip to Israel (earlier posts on our trip can be found on the blog starting\u00a0here<\/a>).\u00a0 I\u2019ll start tonight with\u00a0 third-year student Katie Bricco\u2019s overall take on the trip and understanding of the \u201cother\u201d:<\/em><\/p>\n

We had the opportunity to meet some extremely bright and influential people in the Israel-Palestinian debate.\u00a0 When I think back to the speakers we heard from, my mind turns to the three Arab men that we met.\u00a0 [Ed. note–We met with Justice Joubron of the Israeli Supreme Court, Ali from the Parent’s Circle, and Youssef Jabareen from the Arab Center for Law & Policy.<\/em>]\u00a0 Many of the Israelis (Jews) that we met were committed to the concept of peace and, likewise, were very open minded and tried to present fair assessments of how the conflict affects everyone involved.\u00a0 I felt that I got a very good sense of the conflict from the Israeli perspective, but we often got the Palestinian and Arab Israeli perspective through the lens of an Israeli Jew.\u00a0 There was something about hearing these concerns from people within the affected community that made me want to pay attention.\u00a0 For me, understanding the human rights concerns that the Arab population in Israel faces\u00a0 helps me to understand a facet of war that I have never been able to relate to.<\/p>\n

Essentially, Israeli (Jews)\u00a0are concerned about safety. <\/p>\n

They have a fully formed and functioning country based on Jewish ideals . . . exactly what they envisioned when they fought for independence in the 1940\u2019s.\u00a0 My impression is that Israelis don\u2019t care much about whether Gaza and the West Bank become part of Israel . . . IF turning over the land would mean peaceful borders and interactions between the residents.\u00a0 I can relate to the desire for safety.\u00a0 I\u2019ve lived in a post-9\/11 world filled with Level Orange Alerts and near-body cavity searches to board airplanes.<\/p>\n

I have much more difficulty relating to a systematic cycle of discrimination and segregation that I liken to conditions in the South pre-1950\u2019s. \u00a0The closest comparison I can make is to the segregated inner-city neighborhoods that populate the schools I\u2019ve been privileged to teach in.\u00a0 After championing myself as a forward-thinker in the area of diversity, the most surprising moment of self-awareness on the trip was walking through the Arab markets in Jerusalem and realizing how tense I felt.\u00a0 I was hyperaware of cars with a junk-loaded back seat.\u00a0 I felt nervous when I heard Arab shop owners yelling to each other in Arabic.\u00a0 I think this anxiety stemmed from a combination of being among a culture that was completely unlike my own and thinking of all the images of terrorists I\u2019ve seen on TV and in the movies.<\/p>\n

When I took a step back and began meeting our Arab speakers, I could see that there was no need to be afraid.\u00a0 These people wanted the same thing the Israelis do, a good, safe life.\u00a0 Suddenly, I could see the cycle.\u00a0 Not knowing and understanding another culture makes us afraid.\u00a0 Fear encourages us to separate and discriminate.\u00a0 Discriminating creates anger.\u00a0 Anger causes acting out.\u00a0 Acting out causes fear.\u00a0 This cycle fuels the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but also racial, religious, and class tensions here.\u00a0 The only way to break this cycle is to remove the fear, and to remove the fear, we must understand.\u00a0 Now, I can\u2019t honestly say that a week in the Middle East has made me fearless, but I can say that I am committed to continuing to try and understand.<\/p>\n

Cross posted at Indisputably.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the next few days, I will\u00a0post several blogs compiled of postings from my students who were asked this week to reflect on what they learned from the trip to Israel (earlier posts on our trip can be found on the blog starting\u00a0here).\u00a0 I\u2019ll start tonight with\u00a0 third-year student Katie Bricco\u2019s overall take on the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"","ocean_second_sidebar":"","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"","ocean_custom_header_template":"","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"on","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[66,20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13132","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-human-rights","category-international-law","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13132"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13132\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}