21 - 27 June 2001
Issue No.539
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 21 - 27 June 2001 Issue No.539 |
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What occupation teaches
Hanna Nasir* comments on everyday heroism
I recently witnessed a confrontation with the Israeli occupation forces regarding the closure of the Bir Zeit-Ramallah road. At around 7.30am, I met a group of university professors at the checkpoint (between Ramallah and the campus in Bir Zeit) where Israeli soldiers systematically stop people going to and from Bir Zeit. We wanted to be sure that the students would cross safely and smoothly.
Hundreds of students were there, barred from going to Bir Zeit to attend their classes, which normally start at 8.00am. By 8.30, about 2,000 students were at the checkpoint, waiting patiently as my colleagues and I tried in vain to convince the officer in charge, Itzick (that is the name I heard the soldiers call him), to let them pass so that they would not miss class. He indicated that he was just following higher orders. I was not sure about that, however, because he was allowing some people to pass according to what appeared to be his own whims.
In an effort to touch an element of humanity in the officer, I offered him some fruit and coffee that a student had given me. He refused rudely. He could not conceive that a Palestinian could possibly make a gesture of good will. We all represented something abhorrent to him. Yet all the students were young, cheerful and not much younger than him. They could have been his partners in a swimming club or on a basketball team.
Of course, he was the stronger party. He had a gun and was armed to the teeth. The students had only their books. Yet he felt uneasy, and the students were relaxed. They were on their home territory; it is presently occupied, but they knew that someday that territory would be theirs. On the other hand, officer Itzick realised that someday he would have to leave the area for good. His presence there probably seemed incomprehensible to him. But he was acting according to orders, like a robot -- with orders to shoot and kill.
It might sound a bit exaggerated, but he actually gave orders for his jeep to be revved up, and wanted to drive through the students in an effort to disperse them. Only luck and the students' courage made him stop. Without provocation, he was losing his nerve; in fact, he was probably nervous because there was no provocation. He decided to end the encounter by calling on members of his unit to attack with tear gas, sound bombs and rubber bullets. The students dispersed, and everybody went home. Another inch of earth was shoveled onto the peace process.
I do not know if he went home in the evening and bragged to his friends about what he had done. Maybe they hailed him as a hero. To me, he is no hero. A hero is somebody who can think rationally and humanely and act accordingly, despite orders to the contrary. In my opinion, officer Itzick is just a robot, and no robot can be a hero.
Since the 1967 War and the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza, Israel has succeeded in convincing most of its citizens (and probably the world) that its occupation of Palestinian land is justified. The Israelis are convinced, furthermore, that the young soldiers who maintain security in the occupied territories are heroes. They also believe, somehow, that peace is achievable while occupation continues. They do not seem to understand the simple fact that the price of peace is the end of occupation. Almost every occupier has learned that lesson very well -- albeit later rather than sooner. De Gaulle understood it after many years of French occupation of Algeria. The British understood it too, after years of colonising India. A country can get away with being an occupying force for some time, but certainly not forever.
If officer Itzick had understood and acted upon that reality, he would have been a hero -- on moral grounds at least. But as long as he remains part of an occupying force, and as long as he uses a gun to disperse innocent, unarmed students who are on their way to university, then a hero he is not, and never will be. The real heroes are those Palestinian students and teachers who are able to resist the occupation and at the same time keep living every day, under the most adverse conditions.
* The writer is president of Bir Zeit University.
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