Over the past few days, I have had the opportunity to travel through Israel with my program to different sites that are related to the Arava Institute’s focus on environmental change and peace-building. The trip itinerary was packed: we visited Ashalim, a solar tower in the desert that produces almost 2% of Israel’s electricity, as well as a wastewater treatment plant. (Fun fact: Israel recycles 85% of its wastewater for use in agriculture. The solid waste produced in wastewater treatment is used for either biogas energy or fertilizer for farms.) We also visited the hometowns of two Arab-Israeli participants to learn more about environmental initiatives and life in their villages.
Most moving to me was my visit to Nahal Oz, a kibbutz that is a half-mile from the Israeli border with Gaza. The visit was especially important to me as I lived in Jerusalem during the 2014 war in Gaza and twice had to run to a bomb shelter. Now part of my internship work focuses on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza that is related to the inadequate environmental infrastructure. Going by the border and visibly seeing Gaza helped me piece together these different experiences and better understand the reality of life in the region.
During the visit at Nahal Oz, we viewed Gaza from the fence at the kibbutz and spoke to a kibbutz member. The buildings in the distance were faint, but I could see their density. In between the kibbutz and Gaza are wheat fields and an old industrial park that was meant to be a place where both Israelis and Gazans would work together--but it was bombed by Palestinian terrorists about twenty years ago. I was surprised that I smelled the sea from Nahal Oz, though Gaza is only a few kilometers wide so Nahal Oz is not that far from the ocean.
I also was surprised to learn about the prior positive relationships in the region. Until the mid-2000s, Israelis in the southwest area of the country used to go to the beach in Gaza or pass through Gaza on their way to Tel Aviv. Gazans worked in the farms by Nahal Oz and many kibbutz members had Gazan friends. However, with the rise in terrorism and after Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza and Hamas’s rise, this was no longer the reality. The three people we spoke to in Nahal Oz said they hope for the day when farmers can once again work together in the field, and when they can visit family friends in Gaza.
However, today the situation is very different. The kibbutz member spoke about the terror of the 2014 Gazan war. The kibbutz members only had two to three seconds to respond to a missile, and the Iron Dome (Israel’s defense mechanism that can intercept missiles) does not work in Nahal Oz. Sometimes the Israeli army informs the kibbutz members ahead of time if there is suspicious activity in Gaza, and then the kibbutz members may spend a few hours waiting in their safe houses (bomb shelters). Over the past few years, five tunnels leading from Gaza to the kibbutz have been uncovered by the Israeli army (IDF). According to the kibbutz member who spoke to us, 90% of the houses on the edge of Gaza have missile launchers placed there by Hamas, putting the Gazan families and the IDF in a bad predicament.
From the visit I see that the actions of a few people, largely Hamas, create suffering for many people. Each side is only becoming more polarized. I want to hope for peace, but sometimes the more I learn and the more I hear both the Israeli and Palestinian narratives, the less hopeful I become.