Open2it Community Blog

A friend of mine is attending a fundraiser for a Gaza hospital tonight.  She invited me, but I will not be attending.

I happened to mention this to an Israeli friend of mine, and he went off on the subject.  I know any time I bring up a topic concerning Arab or Muslim, it will usually get a rise out of him, but I'm bad, I can't help myself.

"What do those people know about Israel and Gaza anyway?" he demands.  "Do you think those hospitals would treat a wounded Israeli Jew? but in Israel, they treat everyone all the same."

Well, I have no idea what's what and who's who, so I'm not arguing with him.  I worry about him when I hear him get upset, because he's my friend.  I figure having grown up in Israel under the constant threat (and actual presence) of war, having been deployed at war against the Palestinians as a young man kind of entitles him to whatever opinion he wants to hold.  If nothing else, in my mind his "live life for the moment" attitude stems from all this history.

This all reminds me of the movie, Chinatown, with Faye Dunaway and Jack Nicholson.  Quote from the movie - "You may think you know what you're dealing with, but, believe me, you don't."  You may think for a moment that you can see clearly where the fault lies, but little is black and white in the world.  When you get deep into it, it's all muddy as heck, and are you really helping the right side?

 I'm sure that the atrocities, the deaths, all this is unnecessary.  But no one can convince either side to stop.  Here's an interesting time line provided by Maps-of-War: