The differences!!

I wanted to write several times regarding the differences between the Palestinians and the Israelis. However I always had a second thought that I don’t have the empirical facts to support my ideas. However, this time I will do so, since I think I have the enough material and the experience I need. As a Palestinian woman; maybe it is hard to think that I can analyze the whole situation; accordingly, I am not going to do so. I am going to analyze just a sole difference between these two people; the acceptance.

First I called it the acceptance because it refers to the mental process that it takes place in our heads, and then it leads us to the way to accept others. To accept what other people say, think, act or even argue about. Acceptance may sometimes lead to the adaptation of other’s ideas or way of life or at least it leads to feel relief living and talking to them. Acceptance means, in way or another, the ability to argue in good manner, to talk in humble way and to feel secure while chatting with others.  To accept others; we have to open our minds and hearts and to feel what other people talk about. To accept what people have to say, is to increase our level of knowledge and to analyze; what and why they have to say so! After a while, the acceptance leads us to change, as well as to adaptation in its final process, or at least to think.

This difference between the Palestinians and the Israelis can be demonstrated by several proofs and evidences. The Israeli leaders for example refuses the negotiation process and consider it useless one, while the Palestinians insist on the negotiation as a peaceful way to achieve fair settlement. The Israeli mentality is very hard to break through; it is a military mentality, which means it depends on orders not facts. It is easy for the Israeli to follow orders and not to think too much of the outcomes or the consequences.  On the other hand, the Palestinians, usually, review their ways and methods in order to reach the ultimate goal; as an example they changed from violence to non-violence struggle. Despite that the Israeli still insists on occupying 1967 land, building more settlements and expanding the old ones. To be an Israeli citizen is the hardest thing ever and to transfer your religion into Jewish is the same. This can be examples on the political level, but what about the common or public level!!

Back to my empirical experience and many other (non-Palestinian) people experiences, I can demonstrate that it is almost the same situation unfortunately. It seems that the common people too are still soldiers and have the same military mentality. It is not easy at all to convince an Israeli student to argue or chat with a Palestinian one about the recent situation. Also, it is not easy to break through the minds of the Israeli students or to change their way of thinking. The structure of the Israeli personality is well-built and it is so secure and immune from any outsider’s thoughts or ideas. You may talk to an Israeli students and argue too, but it doesn’t mean in any way that he accept what you say or do,  also, it doesn’t mean that he thinks about you or your words. You can argue as much as you want, but still when the Israeli goes back home, he enjoys the military as a great choice to him. You can argue about the human rights, justice, change and any human issue; still he goes back and serves in the army to fight and kill you. You can try to convince him that you have the right to live and to have a land to live on; nonetheless, he goes back home and totally forget about you. Socialization is the thing that Israeli love just to show, but negotiation is what the Israeli most hates because it forces him to think and to accept. We can go together, we can eat together, we can laugh together and anybody can see us together but we can’t accept each other; this is the Israeli way. We can talk, negotiate and demonstrate together but no one should see us laughing together; this is the Palestinian way.