Paradise Found?

Submitted by Rebecca Moulds (United States), Jan 3, 2008 at 21:22

Last summer I visited Israel for the first time, although only spending three days there, mainly in Jerusalem. I did not feel threatened in any way and enjoyed my stay. My taxi driver,( who was an Arab Israeli) and I developed a quick friendship and one afternoon in between showing me the tourist sights, he took me to his house to meet his family.

They plied me with beverages ranging from Sprite to Turkish coffee and were extremely hospitable. Their English was very good and they also spoke Hebrew. They seemed happy enough and their home was very comfortable, if crowded with extended family members. I"m sure that they wanted to show me how welcoming Arabs can be ( and they are, I used to live in Egypt) and seemed to go out of their way to prove this point.

My driver told me that he liked to live in Israel and wouldn't dream of living in a Palestinian-controlled territory, although he did live in the Arab part of Israel. He also did not say one thing against Jews or Christians or the Israeli government. A panoramic view from a promenade showed the divide between the Jewish side and the Arab side of Jerusalem: there was a definite "line", the Jewish side being lush and green, and the Arab "side" looking rather arid.

He seemed resigned to the fact that the Arab side was so undeveloped, but not angry or resentful, and Arabs in Israel seem to have a much higher standard of living than most Egyptians in Egypt do. I do not understand Israeli politics and how this dictates to the Arab population in Israel, but there seems to be a kind of patriarchal role that Israel plays to its Arab children. Perhaps if I had delved deeper in this very sensitive area I might have learned that there is some resentment to be found amongst the Arabs in Israel, but my one experience didn't show that.

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