The Civilian Sufferer

After sixty-five years, you’d think someone, somewhere, would be able to find a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. What people don’t seem to understand is, it won’t disappear if we simply dismiss it as unsolvable. It will remain one of the world’s major issues unless people make an effort for change, for an answer. Some people ask, why even bother? What’s the point? The point is, people are suffering because of this. Not only Palestinians, Israelis, too. Everyone. 1,104 Israelis and 6,829 Palestinians have been killed in the past four years alone. (source) These are the people who aren’t guilty of urging hatred or violence towards the other side. They are the ones who suffer, and it has to stop.

“Life here has turned upside down; there is war in the Middle East. Everybody is afraid. Last night no one slept well, including me... Three Israeli mothers didn’t sleep well, because they were thinking about their sons kidnapped by Hizbullah. Dozens of Palestinian mothers were not sleeping well because they have lost their sons... A lot of religious people, Jews and Muslims, did not sleep well because they were thinking about Joseph’s Tomb and Tiberias Mosque, both destroyed by mobs this week... We hope the leaders will make a quiet situation for us in the Middle East... They must do it quickly. We want to sleep. We want to sleep. We want to sleep.” (source) These are ordinary people. Civilians. Not just Palestinians and not just Israelis. In the quote Sami al Jundi illustrates the hardships of both groups as a result of the war. They aren’t the people in the government, giving orders to continue the attacks. They aren’t the soldiers carrying out those attacks. They are mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers and friends. They could be anyone. They could be you. They are the ones who suffer the most. They are the ones at risk. They are the ones who want and need this to end.

“I expected legal documents, but instead I was looking at childish drawings made with colored pencils and markers. The first was a tank. The second depicted soldiers on a bloody battlefield...‘My nine-year-old son, Nissan, drew these. He was born into this bloody conflict, just like you.’... I examined the images more carefully. One portrayed the little boy’s family outside his house next to a large, leafy tree. Upon closer inspection, even this scene of domestic tranquility showed evidence of war; Nissan had sketched a bomberplane overhead.” (source) War is not something a child should have to grow up with. It is not something that should be considered normal to them, an aspect of daily life. It should not be this way for anyone. Children in Israel are growing up this way. Everywhere they turn, there is war. Everything they hear is about war. It is in their homes, in their schools, in their minds, always. How can they be expected to change things? Much like Sami al Jundi, because of their environment, many of them will grow up with hatred for the other side, because that is all they know. They will continue this endless cycle of violence and instability in what is supposed to be their home and their holy place. If the youth in Israel came together, Palestinians and Israelis alike, and spoke out against the conflict, there could be hope. The people fighting this war are not the ones who are suffering. Terrorists and extremists and the government are not suffering. It’s the people of this land, no matter their background, who are suffering. Their suffering needs to end.