Reflections on Holy Land

This soil is cherished. The land upon which I am situated has inspired some of the most divisive conflict in human history. From the Knights of Templar and King Solomon to Canaanites and Hyksos, this turf has instigated bestial battle after senseless battle. What we refer to as Semites are likely a blend of Semitic, Persian, Greek, Roman, Turkic, and North African peoples. The illusory notion that pure blood lines tracing back to some frozen, classical era of national glory is far-fetched at best. However, the nationalistic spell is quite potent for all those who claim to be pure descendants of the land's true occupants. And, while the various peoples have varying levels of justification for their practical and/or ancestral-religious claims to the land, ultimately some utilitarian justice must be attained in order quell the irrational and fantastic sense of holy war that swells ethnic egos, fans sectarian strife, and results in a land that becames violent and thusly much less sacred.

Facts on the ground are a popularly imagined way of sizing up the current situation in the context of who lives where, who has to deal with which problems, and where sensible borders lie. While there is rampant unpopularity of the Israeli dream throughout the world, this national-mythological dream is no less genuine or beneficient than the american dream or the european dream, both of which are also dreams founded on western principles, on the backs of slaves/ssubaltern people, in the colonial process of usurpation and eventually permanent attempts at territorial reclamation on behalf of the conquered folks.

Walls that divide civilizations are convenient so that people understand where they are safest, most comfortable, most useful. Even so, ideas we have about permanence and the objective basis for territorial acquisition, settlement, and negotiation are far from eternal. People tend to remember the immediacy of suffering best. And, in the Israeli-Arab conflict, the crucial periods of intense national suffering occurred a mere three years apart. Full-on justification for the Israeli nation-state arose from the ashes of World War II as a combination of Western guilt and Jewish-Zionist redemption forged the possibility of an ethnic-religious homeland. A mere three years later, the Palestinians underwent what they refer to as the "catastrophe" - Nakba. Whereas Israelis refer to this triumphant occasion as "liberation" or "independence." The dualism inherent in this act of passing on "genocide credit" lives on.

The cycles of violence and dim hopes of permanent peace rage on. While a viable economic and geographic unit exists within Israeli borders, the outlying satelite communities of Palestine, which remain halfway under Israeli rule in a semi-Apartheid arrangement, languish and devolve into chaos. Heaps of rubble, omnipresent checkpoints, dug out trenches, ancient fridges contrast with fresh skyscrapers, booming hi-tech, serene beaches, and most of all, the ability to wield POWER. The ability to force submission, arbitrarily enforce law, and create a relationship where colonial oppression gradually rots the once glorious Zionist enterprise. The result is a post-Zionist reality in which naivete has been shattered. The growing threat of political dissolution on both sides leads to a swollen yet broken fantasy in which corruption and complacency prevent the pragmatic discussion of future potential. What can the present tell us about the complex landscape into which we venture?

Am I even a credible observer if I'm not committed to living in this mess? Are my ideals and/or objectivity not possible if I'm not actually from here and/or planning to remain here for the long term? I have a complex about becoming an ideological crusader or a naive intellectual dabbler who refuses to admit where vested interest lies. Is objective evaluation of the circumstances possible given my background? Perhaps most parties in this conflict are not interested in anything more than a subjective account of reality. Scholarly/journalistic accounts of what's truly transpiring might not be attractive for most people who, on a daily basis, must accept the bare facts on the ground. No simple answers are waiting under a mattress in Gaza. No reality is possible other than that which can actually be fostered, nourished, and developed. There is not yet a will, a collective ambition, or a unified mentality on either side that could result in what has formally and colloquially been referred to as "lasting peace."

No one could possibly know what this place will actually look like in 100 years. It would have been impossible three times over to predict one hundred years ago during the final years of Ottoman occupation what would befall this land just 100 years later. It's rather doubtful that the same blue Stars of David will be majestically flying over this land a century down the road. History has sped up exponentially, and fantasy is a hell of a drug.

Enlightened Struggle

I sit here slightly torn between reality and a dream. My dreams have always lead me to believe that it was possible to escape the long-term commitment to a permanent job and a permanent spouse. It is abundantly clear that most of the people I know now seek to shore up the necessary career and social resources to settle down into a stable and viable lifestyle.

Doing this dance in the dark, I cannot quite perceive of where I'm headed. I have just parted ways with my lover, and my views on the future have turned dangerously cynical. I am compelled to accept economic and biological necessity, which means that monogamy and a gainful job are the best long term prospects for success. However, it seems like everyone is caught up in a rat race to add points to their resumes (both of romantic and employment ventures). Is every relationship just a stepping stone to the next one? Must every job simply prepare us for that dream job sometime down the road?

All too often, I hear people talk about relationships as if they were, more than anything else, useful tools to life-advancement. I guess our society is constructed upon certain foundations, namely predictability and personal stability. And, I suppose, for example, that after a healthy, loving relationhip with Layla Tomarchio, Billy Bob Berezovsky is competent enough to carry on the same sort of rapport with Zoe Ataturkey. Human relationships are indeed about comeptency and acquired skills and functional patterns. And, in this same vein, our employment futures link us up with workplaces where our interests, professional capabilities, cultural affinities, and psychological proclivities mesh with the structures already in place. Judging by both the highlights and difficulties of the relationship that I've just been experiencing, I suppose I am all the more primed for the next sort of rapport, should I seek one out. It's supremely important to even out the so-called expectations gap (thanks, Dobson) in order to figure out what can reasonably be demanded of one's partner or job.

So, I retain a lingering suspicion of the settled life and all the rigors of being confined to this "whipped" existence. Even though I've just participated in an enthralling and entirely satisfying intimacy that is ongoing, I harbor fears that I will merely reap the benefits of this relationship to become more enlightened about myself and my needs and then progress teleologically onto the next one. I'm all about enjoying life's ride, right, but I resist the temptation to construct an organized, linear, and methodical journey towards something gradually bigger and better. My issues with commitment are manifold and surely have as much to do with my ability to trust myself as with my willingness to trust someone else.

In some ways, it seems that I desire to map things out so that there is little room for spontaneity. Yet, in most things, I have attempted to preserve a sense of quotidian unpredictability in my struggle. While spontaneous adventures are thoroughly appealing to observers and the observed, they do not lend themselves to the dimensions of civilized, bourgeois existence circa 2006. In this new year, shall I let my reality of being loved be forsaken because it's not practical? When I think about my life and the notion of progress, I fear that I'm perennially getting caught up in trying to move on, move up, and get my piece of the pie.

With this feeling of broken numbness, I'm trying to force myself into redemption. I've just been intensely involved in a relationship with a very insecure future. Perhaps this type of relationship is so natural for me precisely because it's so unpredictable and because there is no definitive end in sight. Continuing on this path of open-ended relations with the second sex guided by dubious long-term strategies, I feel bogged down by emptiness. This struggle catapaults me hyperbolically towards a reality characteristically a mystery yet convincingly some higher form of optimal excitability.

Goodbye sweet thang...