Jesus Christ, Superstar

My weekend in Israel was much like a white bread sandwich.  The beginning and the end (aka the border crossings) weren't so great on their own, but the middle was full of good stuff.  My first moments in Israel were entirely composed of waiting in lines, waiting in more lines, and waiting in chairs.  My last moments involved shelling out a 172 shekel exit tax to the Israeli government.  Also, we somehow managed to get stuck with the least amicable border guards ever, so we all ended up with Israeli passport stamps.  While this is normally a pretty cool memento, the proof in my passport that I've been to Israel means that any future travel plans to basically everywhere in the Middle East save Jordan and Egypt are off until 2019 or I "lose" my passport.  Such is life.

Paul and Lura demonstrate their satisfaction with their Israeli passport stamps.

I've never been more aware of my blond-haired, blue-eyed, white-skinned appearance than at the Israeli border crossing.  Our group was composed of four of the whitest people on the planet and a friend who is half American and half Algerian.  It made me really uncomfortable that he was treated so differently from the rest of us.  No one was mean to him, but he was questioned fairly extensively while no one even gave my passport a second look despite the Syrian visa and Lebanese stamps contained therein. 

The rest of the weekend was a considerable improvement on its somewhat rocky beginning.  Our hostel was smack dab in the middle of Old City Jerusalem for maximum exploring potential.  I loved hearing the beautiful mangle of shofars, calls to prayer, and church bells wafting from their respective quarters.  I loved watching the sunset reflect across the Dome of the Rock from our hostel's roof.  I loved walking around the walls of the Old City with its amazing vistas and glimpses into random backyards.  I loved learning that, at least where I was, Arabic was a much more useful language than Hebrew.  I loved seeing the graffiti that graces walls everywhere.  I loved hearing a group of religious tourists spontaneously begin singing a hymn in the Room of the Last Supper.  And, perhaps most of all, I loved eating bagels. Nomnomnom.

Tamara and I trying to win the AU
Abroad Photo Contest at the Dome of the Rock.

Old City Jerusalem
.

GODZILLA BIRD
Model of Jerusalem at the time of the Second Temple at the Israel Museum.

Despite all these amazing things, the best part of the weekend was hiking up the Mount of Olives, where God will start to redeem the dead on the Day of Judgment, so the story goes.  At the base of the mountain was probably my favorite place in Jerusalem--the Church of Nations and the Garden of Gethsemane, where Jesus was supposedly arrested.  Nothing beats the combination of beautiful mosaics, 2000-year-old olive trees, and a location a little off the beaten path.  At the top of the mountain, we had the most amazing view of the Jerusalem.  Perfection.

View of the cemetery and the Dome of the Rock
from the Mount of Olives.

Church of Nations
.

Adam, Paul, me, Tommy, and Lura on the Mount of Olives

And in conclusion, I saw this:

Really.

"Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars." -Martin Luther King Jr.

I sat down at my computer tonight intending to write an update about my trip to Beirut last weekend or this weekend's adventures in Jerusalem, but I can't get President Obama's announcement about Osama bin Laden out of my head.  I woke up this morning to an inbox full of Washington Post email alerts and a Facebook newsfeed of excited status updates declaring that the world's most wanted man was killed in a CIA operation.  Initially, I didn't think much about it--I was happy because everyone I encountered, virtually or in real life, was happy.  Why shouldn't I be pleased that the world is rid of a hardened terrorist?

As the day wore on, I became more and more uncomfortable with the congratulations offered by my American classmates and the celebratory news coverage.  I am glad that bin Laden's death might provide some closure for victims of al-Qaeda's terrorism and their families.  I am glad that my country accomplished something it set out to do.  I am admittedly even glad that this might help President Obama win reelection next year.  But I can't accept that this is "justice."  My good American values teach me that everyone deserves a fair trial, my UU faith tells me that there is inherent worth and dignity in every person, and my heart has always led me to believe that no one should have the right to play God and take the life of another human being.  My conscience simply cannot write off ten years of civilian deaths in Afghanistan and Pakistan in the name of revenge and, further still, I cannot bring myself to believe that any human life, no matter how tainted by wrongdoing, is worth a bit of positive media coverage and a whole lot of empty justice.

I know many people probably think that I am unrealistic and naive and maybe that is true.  Maybe my idealistic worldview will get me nowhere in life, but I spent the first eighteen years of my life learning about the greatness of American democracy and the last three learning about the double-standard we apply to anyone different from us the moment we get afraid.  If I've learned nothing else during my time in Egypt and Jordan over the course of the past year, it's that the biggest problem many Arabs have with the United States is the inconsistency of our foreign policy--and they're right.  Why do we think that only some people deserve a fair trial--after all, Saddam Hussein and Timothy McVeigh each got one, didn't they?  Why do we think an American life has greater value than the life of an Afghani child caught in the crossfire?  When will we realize that we would get so much farther in the world if we truly led by example instead of brazenly brandishing our military might?

I don't have answers to these questions, so instead I'll just angst-ily sit here and continue to listen to "Let It Be" and Emmanuel Jal's "We Want Peace" on repeat while I try to make sense of the world.  Oh life.  Womp womp.

Edit: My favorite blog, Foreign Policy Passport, weighs in on exactly what I've been musing about.