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April 28, 2006
Living in perfect harmony
Arabs and Jews share common ground in village near Jerusalem.
BARRY DAVIS ISRAEL PRESS SERVICE
A Hollywood director couldn't have found a better location for
Abu Ghosh if he'd tried. The picturesque Israeli Arab village of
6,000 residents nestles neatly, geopolitically and socioeconomically,
in the Jerusalem hills between Kibbutz Kiryat Anavim to the east
and the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community of Telz-Stone just to the
west. In the complex political, cultural and social mosaic of the
Middle East, Abu Ghosh is a truly unique phenomenon.
In 1948, when the modern state of Israel became a corporeal reality,
many Arab villages were abandoned or destroyed in the ensuing War
of Independence. Abu Ghosh was the only one in the area to survive
intact and untouched.
"That was because the people in Abu Ghosh have always attached
great importance to being hospitable," said Mayor Salim Jaber.
"We welcome anybody, regardless of religion or race."
That goes a long way to explaining the traffic jams in Abu Ghosh
on most Saturdays of the year. Over the weekend, the local restaurants
and stores are jam-packed with Israelis, mostly from Jerusalem and
Tel-Aviv, in search of some bona fide hummus, pita bread or other
Arab delicacy.
One eatery that benefits from the Saturday influx is the Abu Ghosh
restaurant owned by Jawdat Ibrahim. Ibrahim spent six years living
in Chicago before returning to Abu Ghosh in 1994.
"I came home," he said simply. "My family has lived
in Abu Ghosh for more than 300 years. It's the only place I call
home."
Ibrahim's choice of profession was not, perhaps, a coincidental
move. As anyone in the Middle East will tell you, politicians generally
march on their bellies and food is an important bonding element
in helping bridge political and cultural divides.
"We have held peace talks in my restaurant," Ibrahim declared,
with more than a hint of pride. "In the 1990s, [then Israeli
foreign minister] Shimon Peres met [Palestinian Authority politician]
Faisal Husseini several times here. And many foreign diplomats and
Israeli ministers have eaten and talked together here."
But the Abu Ghosh restaurant is not the exclusive domain of the
VIP sector. "I feel good when I see so many Jewish Israelis
coming to us over the weekend, and also during the week," said
Ibrahim. "For me, it's a symbol of all of us living together."
Ibrahim is also landlord to six Jewish families who live in an apartment
complex he owns in the village. There are around 40 Jewish families,
all told, living in the village.
"If you take a negative angle on the situation, you could say
we – the Arabs and Jews – have to live together whether
we like it or not," he noted. "But I prefer to take a
positive approach. We are all family. We are descendants of Abraham
or Ibrahim. It is only right that we should live together in harmony.
That's normal life. That's the way it should be."
In a country where even the most innocent of acts can be interpreted,
or misinterpreted, as having political motives, young Jewish mother
Sarah Hillman said there was nothing political, or even ideological,
about her decision to move to Abu Ghosh.
"We have been living here about a year," she explained.
"We were looking for somewhere quiet close to Jerusalem and
we checked out all the local moshavim (villages) and kibbutzim.
Abu Ghosh is the cheapest place in the area."
There are those who would prefer to pay the extra money and live
in an exclusively Jewish area, but Hillman said she had "no
problems about living here as a Jewish minority. To begin with,
I felt like a bit of a tourist. But now we all just get on with
our lives. It feels perfectly natural to live here."
Many would disagree with Ibrahim's notion of Jews and Arabs living
and working together. But he said he is an optimist and a realist,
believing that, "the majority on both sides want to get on
together."
According to Jaber, there's nothing new about Jewish residency in
Abu Ghosh or harmonious living between local Jews and Arabs. "There
have been Jews in Abu Ghosh since the beginning of the 20th century,"
he explained. "I had a Jewish neighbor from Iraq who lived
in Abu Ghosh from 1948 until her recent death."
Jaber backs his sunny view of local geopolitics with some history,
and said the leaders of the village realized they had far more to
gain by co-operating with the Zionists who began moving to pre-state
Palestine from Europe and other areas.
"The Abu Ghosh family came here from the Caucasian Mountains
in the 17th century," he said. "We have always gotten
along with our neighbors - that's just the way we are. We looked
beyond the here and now. The village was in favor of the state of
Israel, because they knew that this was the way forward, the way
to develop in a modern world."
That doesn't mean all is well in the village.
"We have a lot of problems here," Jaber conceded. "Until
recently, we had no high school and the kids had to go to school
in East Jerusalem and other places. We also need to find a solution
for children with special needs."
In a region where land is a constant bone of contention, Abu Ghosh
is no exception.
"We had 72,000 dunams (around 13,000 acres) before the state
of Israel was established," said Jaber. "Now we have just
2,000, with another 2,000 in the Matteh Yehuda Regional Council
area. That is a heavy price to pay, even though we were happy to
support the Jewish state."
The upside, albeit with a musical slant, has helped put Abu Ghosh
on the local multi-ethnic and cultural map. The twice-yearly Abu
Ghosh Music Festival has Jews and Arabs in the thousands flocking
to outdoor locations and churches in the village. Every spring and
fall – coinciding with the holidays of Passover and Sukkot
– Israelis of every ethnic and cultural hue converge on the
Kiryat Yearim Church, the Crusader Church and the Crypt to hear
works by Bach, Handel, Schubert and Vivaldi performed by the likes
of the choirs of the Royal Academy of Stockholm and the London Bach
Society, as well as local singers and instrumentalists.
"It is a wonderful festival," said Gershon Cohen, who
resurrected the event 25 years ago after a hiatus of a dozen years.
"The whole place comes alive during the festival. You get all
sorts of people coming to the concerts. No one cares about politics
when listening to Handel's Messiah."
There are some who fear that, with the Hamas victory in the recent
Palestinian elections, the delicate balance may soon be rudely disturbed.
Ibrahim thinks otherwise. "I spoke to lots of Arabs who voted
for Hamas, but none said they supported them," he recounted.
"They said it was a vote against the inability of Fatah to
make progress. I am certain life will go on in Abu Ghosh with Jews
and Arabs living and working side by side. I believe the vast majority
of people here realize that now."
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