Friday night at an Arab village in the Galilee

The village is called M'ghar (pronounced M'rar - rolling the "r"s like the French do). It's a village of 20,000 people - 50% Druze and the rest Christians and Moslems. We were a group of about 80 people that were hosted from all over the country - Orthodox Jews, Christians, Moslems, Druze - from as far South as Eilat. The interfaith conference began and most of it was in Arabic so we tried to pick out the familiar words - and were only able to make out words like "but, possible, people, new, Jewish, Muslim, Christian, God, garden, love" - and not much more. It was as if they were telling us - you guys better learn this language, or you'll be left out of the loop.

We wanted to have an interfaith weekend here because about a year ago or so this city was hit with strife between Druze and Christians. It began when some Christian teens, for a joke - but a bad joke - put a photo of a Druze girl superimposed on some nude woman so it looked like she was in the raw and they circulated it among the school, among their friends, etc. This caused chaos among the two factions and homes and cars were vandalized and the once peaceful pastoral village was not a pleasant place to live in any longer. Christians pulled their children out of local schools because their children were harassed and police weren't intervening and arresting the perpetrators. Somehow the vandalism stopped but the tension is still there.

Getting back to the lectures, I started to get restless and went to the bathroom and saw that dreaded sign "do not throw paper into the toilet" which meant their plumbing was shit, as is the case in most Arab villages. I thanked the Good Lord for making me temporarily constipated for the entire weekend.

We were hosted by local families and went to put our stuff in their homes. Our host (for me and another older Jewish woman) was a Moslem man, with 6 children and a wife who only spoke Arabic but understood some Hebrew. Their university-going teen daughter translated our conversations for her.

Among our first conversations with them - they told us that their daughter could only major in certain areas at Haifa University because others subjects like Physics were only taught to those over age 21 - meaning that if you are Arab and because you do not go into the army for 3 years and you begin university at 18, you cannot major in certain areas like Physics. We had no idea such was the case. She is now taking statistics.
**(See comments relating to this post - there were a few stating that such is not the case - but I will tell you that in our experience for the past 10 years, you can go to certain bureaucratic agencies and be given 10 different answers to your queries - and it can be sometimes quite difficult and frustrating to get the correct answer - this may have been the case here - but thanks to those who commented and I will try to go to the trouble of having her speak to someone at the University).

Before leaving for dinner, I asked our hosts if they mind me lighting Sabbath candles which they promptly wanted to light for me. I told them I had to do it. I recited the blessing over the Shabbat candles and I think it was a first for them to experience this in their home.



We took a tour of the village where our Druze tour guide drove us through ancient olive groves. Their trunks were odd and it looked like they were hugging each other - some trunks were visibly hollow in the middle. He told us a Druze legend about King Solomon. That when he died all the trees became sad and lost their leaves. Except for the olive tree - and the others reprimanded that tree for being so heartless. But the olive tree was in fact so upset that its trunk finally burst resulting from holding in its agony.

Dinner began with the Jewish blessing over grape juice (instead of wine because of the Moslem prohibition of alcohol). There's a point in the blessing where we all sing "Because you have chosen us, and made us holy over all the nations..." I suddenly became aware that the Others standing around listening to this traditional blessing, understand Hebrew and, oy vey, I was totally embarrassed. I pointed it out over dinner and the other Jewish women at the table were thinking the exact same thing.



After dinner it was back to our host's home where we chatted until 1:00 am in the morning. And Saturday is not a day off for Moslems. Even so, we spoke about everything - my "roomie" and I both shared our vision of one peaceful land with two Prime Ministers - one Jewish and one Arab. If you guys want to call it Palestine, call it Palestine. For us it will always be Israel. All we want is to live peacefully with one another. Our host was curious about what is inside our "mezuzah" and I told him which prayer it was - which is basically also a Moslem prayer - that God is One. We wanted to know whether he was taught that Jesus was Jewish. Of course the answer was - no. Jesus was Christian, they insisted. I told them for about 100 years or so afterwards (correct me if I am wrong, folks) those following Jesus weren't yet called Christians. They were stunned to hear of Jesus' Jewish origins and the Last Supper being a Pesach Seder.

Wrapping up the evening in the early morning hours, we told our hosts how petrified our families were at us spending a night over at an Arab home. I get angry at my family at this point, when they talk shit like this. So I'm going to tell you of all the dangerous things that happened to me that night.

* I drank a zillion cups of fantastic coffee, "spiked" with crushed cardamom seeds
* We were invited to their daughter's upcoming wedding in August
* Our host invited himself to my home for one night when he has to be in Jerusalem one day next month
* We were being plied endlessly with munchies and soft drinks - non stop.

And I can only finish Part I of my trip with one thought.

To those of you who visit Israel or who live in Israel and are too scared to spend some time in an Arab village experiencing what I experienced for the first time, you are missing out on something very special. So despite what you fear because of what you hear in the media, etc. - just try it. Just once. You won't be sorry.