"Our politicians bicker about who said what and who will recognize whom and then change their minds when a new slate of officials is eleted. All this while babies die from malnutrition, mothers bleed to death in childbirth, and an old lady with cancer is held up at the Erez Crossing because someone is trying to teach someone else a lesson." (126)
Izzeldin Abuelaish's memoir is passionately written but dense, especially for someone like me, who is not deeply educated in the conflicts between Palestine and Israel. Abuelaish makes a sincere effort to educate the reader on issues of Israeli-Palestinian conflict but comes off dry and mainly informative at times.
More specifically, though, he writes about the plight of the people living in the Gaza Strip. People who do not have access to running water every day, enough food to feed their families, adequate medical care or even the freedom to leave the strip of their own accord. He uses his own family as an example of the suffering, most notably through the description of the deaths of his three daughters and niece from an Israeli bombing.
Through his explanation of life and events in the Gaza Strip, he does make the human aspect of the issue shine despite the slow political explanations, which, I think, is the main point of the book. His plight does not have so much to do with the religious or political issues but the human aspect asserting that we are all, innately, the same...human. We all, at our core, have the same wants, needs, and desires and should treat one another with this understanding and respect. Hate and revenge only beget more hate and revenge and accomplish nothing aside from tearing families apart and hurting people.
"Judging others without knowing anything about them is what causes tension, apprehension, distrust, and prejudice. This is a big mistake. We need to be open-minded enough to want to get to know each other...By knowing one another on a personal level, we can begin to respect each other's differences, but more important, we can begin to see how truly similar we are." (229)
Through his explanation of life and events in the Gaza Strip, he does make the human aspect of the issue shine despite the slow political explanations, which, I think, is the main point of the book. His plight does not have so much to do with the religious or political issues but the human aspect asserting that we are all, innately, the same...human. We all, at our core, have the same wants, needs, and desires and should treat one another with this understanding and respect. Hate and revenge only beget more hate and revenge and accomplish nothing aside from tearing families apart and hurting people.
"Judging others without knowing anything about them is what causes tension, apprehension, distrust, and prejudice. This is a big mistake. We need to be open-minded enough to want to get to know each other...By knowing one another on a personal level, we can begin to respect each other's differences, but more important, we can begin to see how truly similar we are." (229)
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