On Childbearing in Times of War

On Childbearing in Times of War
December 12, 2002

Hi everyone,

My next assignment in Iraq has been delayed until December 26--January 10. I'm looking forward to getting another Christmas in Bethlehem, Jerusalem, and Ramallah, and the Thaljiehs and Tannouses won't be so disappointed, though I would have found
Christmas in Baghdad beyond amazing. I wonder how New Year's will be.

If you want to see what made my week, check out http://www.wartburg.edu and read a few back issues of the Wartburg Trumpet. I was so excited by all the student activism against the war and open debate of our devastating foreign policy, the awareness of our world generated on a small Iowa Lutheran college campus that I call home, I almost cried. Much better than many days off for a war- weary human rights worker who sometimes wonders if there is any hope left.

Yesterday was a particularly hard time for our team. Two days ago good friends of ours, Atta and Rodeina Jaber, had armed settlers begin bulldozing their property to build settlement roads--200 yards from each side of their house, and along the crest of the hill their farmland and house are built on. Rodeina was two months pregnant, but the stress of the settlers' armed presence taking over their land proved too much and she began bleeding yesterday morning. Doctors Without Borders went out to their house and brought her in to the hospital where she miscarried. Today Atta is coming into town to bring her home and make funeral arrangements. The team is going out to visit them later this week.

These are the kinds of things that have the deepest emotional impact on me. Perhaps because so many of the mothers here are women my age. I keep telling myself that every olive tree, every grape vine can be replanted; and every house rebuilt. But it is the loss of life, particularly children that is so devastating and irreplaceable. It seems increasingly that having children is more an act of faith than nature when you're in a place where your children will innocently and violently die.

I think about adult sons, Palestinian and Israeli, too. Sons who choose to put their lives on the line. Of course, both sides say there is no choice. But if your son will not be there to harvest your fields or raise his family in your house because he joined the militias, what good is house or land? If your son is not there in your affluent suburb because he died maintaining the Occupation, what was the good of coming to Israel? I know both Palestinian and Israeli mothers, somehow deep down, know this also. Even when each side's propaganda machine tells them to be proud and their child died a hero. Death is not forever, but its memory lasts a lifetime. There is really so little in this life worth dying or killing for.

I think I wrote after the shootout here that we saw the bodies of the Palestinian fighters lying in the field, their bodies bloated by the hours and the sun. (The bodies of the Israeli fighters were evacuated in the night.) Looking at them, I knew that they knew they would die. They believed they were defending their country. And their ambush probably was well within the guidelines of "Just War" and international law, i.e., resisting Occupation forces by attacking armed combatants only, and firing on additional waves of firing soldiers as they approached before they themselves were shot. And yet when I looked at them I was overwhelmed with the thought, "What a waste." In the end, the ambush helped nothing. Just like the closures, curfews, assassinations, shelling, strafing, and missiles help nothing. I see everyday firsthand how violence is neither a creative nor productive means of resolving conflict. Instead, it only creates and produces waste. What a waste.

The hope I hold onto is when I hear that even in the Palestinian militias, this very topic is now a subject of open debate. The attacks continue, but the support dwindles ever steadily. The show of force has gained nothing towards independence. And did you know there are thousands of Israeli refuseniks? They dodged the draft by leaving Israel for the US or Europe or wherever else they had passports for. Of course, they would make a greater impact with their resisting presence here. But even in the papers, the Occupation is questioned more heavily each day. It's publicly known that very few Israelis are happy to send their children to defend lunatic settlers in Hebron these days.

I've got a long weekend of strategizing meetings and trainings for ISM in Ramallah and Bethlehem, then back to Heb-town for a few weeks and packing up for the big Iraq trek. I am slightly excited about an impending shopping spree--I have to get some dress duds before I return to Baghdad. I get excited over any departure from reality. You should see how excited I am about the Lord of the Rings movie coming out next week. Incidentally, I was informed by my teammates that I do a nice Hobbit impression when I puff out my cheeks....

Le Anne