So, yesterday's post
was on my Journey To Palestine.
Today I have written
about what I experienced during my stay there.
Before I begin, I want
to emphasise on one thing. The media. As true as it is, Palestinian
boys getting beaten by Israeli soldiers, the elderly getting harassed
etc, things are not as bad as they seem. And by this I mean, it all
looks too dangerous to visit and people like us will be too afraid to
go to Palestine. But after staying there for a few days I can say
that it is actually a safe place to travel to. There were occasions
were it seemed dangerous but as Brits and people with powerful
passports, we need to visit the holy land more and let them know that
we come from every corner of this world. We stand strong with our Palestinian brothers and sisters and we need to help them with their
businesses.
Arab Hospitality
One thing I loved about
Palestine was the smiles and hospitality the Arabs had. I have been
to a few Arab countries and their hospitality is immense hence the
term 'Arab Hospitality' however, Palestinian hospitality breaks the
scales. And let me not even start on the Kneffeh (a sweet cheesy
stringy dessert) which I have only dreamt of having. (I have always
wanted to try it in Palestine that when I saw it in Egypt during the
summer, I stopped myself from trying it)
These Arabs are going
through such a tough time living in a land which is being occupied.
We met a taxi driver
who was arrested at the age of 13 for throwing stones at a military
tank, a shopkeeper who was in an Israeli prison for 13 years, men who
were made to leave their homes so illegal settlers could occupy them
yet their eyes sparkled whenever they greeted us with 'Salaam
Aleykum' – Peace be upon you.
We met a young boy
called Ishaac who was 13 years old (he turned 14 when we were) who
had been arrested twice. The first time he was arrested, he said how
scared he was. They took him for no reason. They imprisoned him for a
few weeks and denied him food sometimes and it got really cold. The
second time they arrested him, he did not care. He made a joke of it.
This is the courage the youth of Palestine have. They stand their
ground and show no signs of weakness.
Despite such hardship,
they still had hope and happiness and this is something which I did
not see on the other side. I will come onto this later.
Dream come true
On the first day at 4am
when we woke up for the morning prayer – Fajr Salaah, we walked
through the Old City to get to the Al Aqsa Compound, I felt so
excited. Something which I had been dreaming of was finally becoming
a reality. I had the same emotions as when I lay my eyes upon the
Ka'bah in 2014. Except this time I did not cry but I felt so blessed.
I was allowed to be here when thousands of Palestinians were denied
entry. I was allowed to be here while an apartheid wall was built to
stop people from coming anywhere near to Jerusalem.
Non- Muslims are not
allowed to enter the compound however there are certain days where
tourists can see everything but they must enter from a different
gate.
Before we entered the
gates to enter the compound, Israeli soldiers would ask us if we were
Muslims. There were occasions where they would ask us for our
passports or ask us to recite a verse from the Qur'an even though
they did not know it properly.
Palestinians have to
leave their ID's at the gate when they want to enter and have to
retrieve them after prayers when leaving the compound. After passing
them we would greet the Muslim brothers at the gate with a happy
Salaam. The soldiers outside always held rifles while the Arabs
didn't have any weapons. Their weapons were their smiles.
I was spoilt for choice
throughout my time there whenever the calls to prayer echoed through
the city. Shall I pray at Masjid Al Aqsa or the Dome Of The Rock?
They were just a minute apart from each other. It didn't even matter
for the rewards one gets for praying anywhere on the compound, inside
or outside the mosques, is the same.
The importance of Al
Aqsa
For those who may not
know, here is a brief explanation into why this land is the third
holiest place for Muslims.
Al Aqsa was the
direction in which Muslims used to pray towards until God gave the
last Prophet Muhammad (saw) the orders that the direction was to
change and Muslims would have to face the Kab'ah (God's house) in
Makkah which Muslims turn to five times a day now. The Dome of the
Rock is significant because it is believed that our prophet was taken
from Madina (in Saudi Arabia) to Jerusalem in one night on a flying
horse call the 'Buraq'. It was from here that he was ascended to the
seven heavens and was later brought down with all the prophets and
led the prayer on this compound. Only God knows how many prophets
there were, thousands probably but every single one of them has
prayed on the compound of Al Aqsa. Pretty significant ey. So you can
now understand how special it is for Muslims when they get the chance
to go there especially during these difficult times of the
occupation.
During our time in
Palestine we managed to see different parts of Jerusalem. The Al Aqsa
compound, the different gates which led to different places in the
market, the Church of Mary, the church were Jesus was crucified and
laid on the table, the mosques and memorials of the companions of our
Prophet (saw), the prison where Suleiman (as) (King Solomon) locked
up Jinns (spirits from the parallel universe), the wailing wall which
is very symbolic for the Jews, the Mount Olives.
Hebron
 |
| Tomb of Ibrahim (as) |
We visited Hebron –
in Arabic it is called Khalil – the name God gave to Ibrahim (as)
(Abraham) which means friend. Here is the mosque where Prophet
Ibrahim (as) is buried along with his wife Saira, one of his son's
Ishaac (Isaac) and his wife and another son Yousef (Joseph) who was
one of the most beautiful people God created. (It is said that when
men enter heaven they will have the beauty of Yousef (as)
The thing about this
mosque is that it is divided into two parts. About 60% of it belongs
to the Jews and only 40% belongs to the Arabs. When seeing the tomb
of Ibrahim (as) there were two windows. One from the Synagogue side
and one from the side of the Mosque.
 |
| Memorial of Yunus (as) |
On the way to Hebron,
our driver went off route a little and showed us a mosque where
Prophet Yunus's (Jonah) memorial is. He is the prophet who was
engulfed by a Whale and was spat out after he pleaded to God to save
him. This town was called Halhul which means (something along the
lines of) 'coming for one year'. This is the town where Yunus (as)
came and stayed for a year after being spat out by the whale.
Going around Palestine
On one of the days we
went to a place called Jaffa which the Mediterranean sea borders. We
then went to see the sea of Galilee. From there we went to Jericho
which is the lowest point on the earth. I absolutely loved Jericho.
It was just a Palestinian place and the people were all so loving.
Everyone we greeted told us we were welcome to Palestine. “Ahlan w
Sahlan, welcome to Falesteen” It was quite surprising that most of
the Palestinians we spoke to had very good English. But then again
one of the highest number of graduates come from Palestine. The only
problem is that they struggle to find jobs .
We also went to
Bethlehem to the church of nativity where Jesus was born. It was a
pretty church but we saw something unusual. Right on top of the
images of Jesus there was an image of a triangle with the eye – the
FreeMason thing everyone always talks about.
A negative experience
On our last full day in
Palestine, we decided that we were going to go to the Jewish quarters
to see what it was like there. So we went past the wailing wall, came
out from the other side, went up some stairs where we stopped to see
the breath taking view of the Masjid Al Aqsa and the Dome of the
Rock. It looks amazing from this spot.
We carried on going up.Me and my sisters do
not usually wear the headscarf – The Hijab, but on this spiritual
journey in Palestine, we decided to keep it on. So as we were going
up these stairs in our Hijab, we were getting looks. We were probably
the only Muslims people there at that moment. An old lady was shaking
a cup of loose change begging for money. When she saw us, she leaned
back in her chair and made noises of disgust whilst putting on a face
as though she had seen rodents. She said some things in Hebrew and
Lord only knows if she was cursing us but it was very apparent she
was showing hate towards us. We were in shock. How dare she show such
disrespect?! We went up a little more and there was a Jewish man in a
robe and top hat who smiled at us and welcomed us to Israel. This was
such a contrast to the woman we had seen a few seconds ago. It
started raining and we walked uphill through an alley way where a few
kids were gathered outside a door. They looked at us and my sister
greeted them with hello. What we received was a mocking 'neh neh neh'
and giggles. Not once had we encountered such an experience in the
Arab quarters. It wasn't long before we felt unsafe, unwelcome and
decided to head back towards where we came, back into the quarters
where Arabs were.
In no way do I want to
imply that Jews are bad or not nice, but this was one of my
experiences which I felt very sad and uncomfortable in.
It was sad that a woman
showed disgust towards us when she saw that we are Muslims from our
head scarves. Jews also wear the head scarf or the wig when they want
to cover their hair.
It was sad that these
kids mocked us because it shows that they have been taught from a
young age to dislike or hate people who may not be Jews.
It saddened me more
that history was once again repeating itself and the people who were
once victims of the Holocaust, killed in thousands because of their
religion, their colour, their appearance, were now victimising people
who have allowed them to live on their land. Jews were made to wear
yellow bands on their arms so it was apparent that they were Jews...
Today Palestinians are made to carry ID cards.
The same day in the
evening it was pouring down with rain. We prayed the evening prayer
after sunset – Maghrib Salaah and I decided to come back to the
hotel with my sister and one of the sister's in the group to change
and then return for the night time prayer – Esha Salaah. It was a
10-15 minutes journey back to the hotel and as we exited the gate of
the Old City, Herrods Gate, we could hear loud screaming. We came
towards a group of Palestinians with their phones out taking videos
of where the screaming was coming from. I could also hearing the
thumping sound of a baton hitting bare skin. I looked towards where
the sound was coming from and saw that a few Israeli soldiers were
beating up a Palestinian boy who couldn't have been any older than
18.
The other soldiers were
trying to push Palestinians out of the way pointing their rifles
towards them, and within minutes a Jeep of more soldiers had attended
the scene. I do not know what this young boy did but I don't think he
was that much of a threat where more than ten soldiers were needed.
No one was able to
intervene and help the boy or else they would be putting their life
at risk. It's a shame that this was a common site for many people in
Palestine. It came as a shock to me.
Filming the incident
was all people could do as this is the way to make others outside of
Palestine aware of what happens on the ground. We left the scene,
changed and when returning to the mosque for the final prayer, the
area was back to normal and the crowd had disappeared.
During our last two
days it was raining heavily. It seemed as though Jerusalem was sad to
see us leave but I say this now, this may have been my first time
going to Palestine, but it certainly will not be my last.
(Part 3, Journey From
Palestine will be posted tomorrow)
If you haven't already, check out my Journey To Palestine
Loved your details. Lucky you :)
ReplyDeleteHesham,