Diary

Dazed and Confused in Old Jaffa

Maurice Jacobsen

Winter 2014

 

I must confess to being a bit troubled at this moment.   I'm in the Old City of Jaffa, immediately next to Tel Aviv, at a completely charming cafe, eating Italian food, listening to Brazilian music, with Mexican art work on the walls.

 

The menu is in Hebrew, but historically this was an Arabic neighborhood.

 

All of which forces the mind (well at least this mind) to realize how incredibly geographically and politically close we are to repression and brutality taking place on a massive order of magnitude almost literally within shouting distance.

 

Think about it.....within a half-day drive (if border crossings were not an issue) we could be in Damascus, in the middle of an incredibly ugly and bloody civil war, in Cairo where authoritarian, repressive rule is becoming the order of the day, in Za'atari Refugee Camp, now the forth largest city in Jordan, a barbed wire refugee encampment housing over 200,000 men, women, and children who have nowhere to go.

 

We are literally an hour away from Gaza where a million and a half are completely cut off from the outside world under siege, slowly being environmentally and economically suffocated. 

 

And not the least to remember, the West Bank, where Palestinians who perhaps even once held title to this very spot are barred from entering by an Israeli political and military system over which they have little to no control.

 

They cannot enjoy this same food and company this wonderful cafe exemplifies.

 

It's criminal, it's actually more than criminal, it's an outrage that has to be constantly addressed. Everyone should and must be allowed to enjoy a good meal with friends and family.  This place should and must remain opened,  to be enjoyed by everyone, no matter their religious or cultural background.

 

So my task, for better or worse, is to continue to use the media tools at the ready to work long and persistently to help open borders, breakdown prejudices, find resolutions.  And God willing, remain healthy, sane and solvent in the process.