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Modesto Bee, CA
March 23 2008
Middle East violence viewed up close
By JEFF JARDINE
[email protected]
last updated: March 23, 2008 02:24:07 AM
Sarkis Elmassian and Irit Goldman had never met until they visited
The Bee last week.
They didn't need a formal introduction. These Modesto residents knew
why they were there and began their debate the moment they sat down.
They didn't need any help, prodding or mediation. The bitterness runs
deep. It began in the Holy Land thousands of years ago and transcends
them both.
They were born to disagree, and it didn't take long to figure out
that "disagree" is a pretty wimpy adjective.
Goldman, a native of Israel, and Elmassian, an Armenian from Lebanon,
graciously accepted our invitation to discuss the violence that has
long plagued the Middle East, including recent events involving the
Gaza Strip, the West Bank and Israel.
Solve in an hour or so the myriad social, spiritual and political
problems that began more than a millennium before the time of Christ?
Nobody's
that naive or foolish -- least of all Elmassian and Goldman.
Instead, it was an opportunity for two local residents with strong
opinions and strong ties to their homelands to frame the reasons why
peace never seems to be an option there. Perhaps they could explain
the issues to generations of readers who don't know the source of the
conflict -- only that it's gone on for an eternity, with no end in
sight.
Last week, Israeli soldiers killed a Palestinian farmer along a
border fence, a day after Palestinian militants fired a half-dozen
rockets into the city of Sderot in Israel, causing no damage or
casualties.
Elmassian is 59 and a Christian. Goldman is 57, a Jew whose parents
survived the Holocaust, and she comes from Ashkelon, an Israeli town
recently under attack. They share this much: They came to Modesto,
five years apart, from the same part of the world. Both are
psychologists. Both say they want only peace for their homelands.
And both believe the media, The Bee included, routinely fail to
accurately tell their side whenever the region makes the news. Such
was the case over the past month when Hamas, the Islamic Resistance
Movement voted into power in the Gaza Strip, shelled Goldman's
hometown of Ashkelon, and when the Israelis retaliated against towns
in the Gaza Strip.
For 6,000 years, groups have fought over a region that gave birth to
three faiths: Judaism, Christianity and Islam, and they're still
fighting over it today.
Israelis decry the violence when their people are killed by Hamas.
Palestinians decry the violence when their people are killed by the
Israelis.
The violence has gone on for so long that every attack is a response
to a previous attack. Who started it? Who remembers?
That became clear as Elmassian and Goldman talked, challenging every
statement or assertion the other made because they simply do not and
cannot agree.
Count Elmassian's Lebanon among the nations at war with Israel at
some point. Tensions are always high among Israel and its neighbors:
Lebanon, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Iraq.
Elmassian said he does not support Hamas, but said the Israelis'
treatment of Palestinians perpetuates hostilities.
"When a kid is being abused as a child, he'll grow up being abusive
as an adult," Elmassian said. "It's not surprising the Palestinian
kid grows up to be a terrorist if he doesn't know anything else
growing up. The suffering. If you were a Palestinian living there,
you'd be crazy not to have a hatred for Israelis."
Although some Christians live in the Gaza Strip, where 1.44 million
people live on just 146 square miles, the population mainly is
Muslim.
Goldman said that when Israeli forces retook the Gaza Strip during
the Six-Day War in 1967, "they found school books that taught them to
hate the Jews," she said. "(Children) are taught from a young age,
instead of let's make peace, they're taught to hate."
When Elmassian questioned why Israelis are in the region at all, she
answered: "This was the promised land, in the Old Testament, when we
were brought from Egypt."
To which Elmassian replied: "If you believe that legend." He said the
Torah, the first five books of the Old Testament, includes stories
that predate Abraham, the father of Judaism, by 1,500 years, in
essence challenging the Torah's validity.
Goldman told of an Israel in which Arabs live, work and trade in
peace.
She spoke of the suffering imposed upon the Arabs by Israelis during
the attacks or responses (again, depending on one's perspective).
"I agree, they are suffering terribly," Goldman said. "Guess who
succeeded in bombing Ashkelon? Who brings it on themselves? Hamas
does, for its own people."
Elmassian quoted former Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin calling
Palestinians "insects that have to be crushed." (Begin's actual quote
read: "We are as different from the inferior races as they are from
insects.")
Goldman spoke of the reasons Israelis must defend themselves and
criticized Hamas for destroying holy sites in Ashkelon.
"Throw rocks, and you'll get rocks back," she said, though rockets
are more like it.
Their arguments predate them both. The question is, will it ever
stop?
"How can we solve the problem between the Palestine and Israel?"
Goldman asked. "Where no children are killed, where no holy sites are
destroyed?"
It's continued for thousands of years. It's something world leaders
haven't been able to settle in the past 60 years.
Mostly, these two explained the passionate feelings that have
prevented a true peace in Palestine.
They did so without guns, rockets or car bombs. By historical
standards, it was a pretty good first meeting.
March 23 2008
Middle East violence viewed up close
By JEFF JARDINE
[email protected]
last updated: March 23, 2008 02:24:07 AM
Sarkis Elmassian and Irit Goldman had never met until they visited
The Bee last week.
They didn't need a formal introduction. These Modesto residents knew
why they were there and began their debate the moment they sat down.
They didn't need any help, prodding or mediation. The bitterness runs
deep. It began in the Holy Land thousands of years ago and transcends
them both.
They were born to disagree, and it didn't take long to figure out
that "disagree" is a pretty wimpy adjective.
Goldman, a native of Israel, and Elmassian, an Armenian from Lebanon,
graciously accepted our invitation to discuss the violence that has
long plagued the Middle East, including recent events involving the
Gaza Strip, the West Bank and Israel.
Solve in an hour or so the myriad social, spiritual and political
problems that began more than a millennium before the time of Christ?
Nobody's
that naive or foolish -- least of all Elmassian and Goldman.
Instead, it was an opportunity for two local residents with strong
opinions and strong ties to their homelands to frame the reasons why
peace never seems to be an option there. Perhaps they could explain
the issues to generations of readers who don't know the source of the
conflict -- only that it's gone on for an eternity, with no end in
sight.
Last week, Israeli soldiers killed a Palestinian farmer along a
border fence, a day after Palestinian militants fired a half-dozen
rockets into the city of Sderot in Israel, causing no damage or
casualties.
Elmassian is 59 and a Christian. Goldman is 57, a Jew whose parents
survived the Holocaust, and she comes from Ashkelon, an Israeli town
recently under attack. They share this much: They came to Modesto,
five years apart, from the same part of the world. Both are
psychologists. Both say they want only peace for their homelands.
And both believe the media, The Bee included, routinely fail to
accurately tell their side whenever the region makes the news. Such
was the case over the past month when Hamas, the Islamic Resistance
Movement voted into power in the Gaza Strip, shelled Goldman's
hometown of Ashkelon, and when the Israelis retaliated against towns
in the Gaza Strip.
For 6,000 years, groups have fought over a region that gave birth to
three faiths: Judaism, Christianity and Islam, and they're still
fighting over it today.
Israelis decry the violence when their people are killed by Hamas.
Palestinians decry the violence when their people are killed by the
Israelis.
The violence has gone on for so long that every attack is a response
to a previous attack. Who started it? Who remembers?
That became clear as Elmassian and Goldman talked, challenging every
statement or assertion the other made because they simply do not and
cannot agree.
Count Elmassian's Lebanon among the nations at war with Israel at
some point. Tensions are always high among Israel and its neighbors:
Lebanon, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Iraq.
Elmassian said he does not support Hamas, but said the Israelis'
treatment of Palestinians perpetuates hostilities.
"When a kid is being abused as a child, he'll grow up being abusive
as an adult," Elmassian said. "It's not surprising the Palestinian
kid grows up to be a terrorist if he doesn't know anything else
growing up. The suffering. If you were a Palestinian living there,
you'd be crazy not to have a hatred for Israelis."
Although some Christians live in the Gaza Strip, where 1.44 million
people live on just 146 square miles, the population mainly is
Muslim.
Goldman said that when Israeli forces retook the Gaza Strip during
the Six-Day War in 1967, "they found school books that taught them to
hate the Jews," she said. "(Children) are taught from a young age,
instead of let's make peace, they're taught to hate."
When Elmassian questioned why Israelis are in the region at all, she
answered: "This was the promised land, in the Old Testament, when we
were brought from Egypt."
To which Elmassian replied: "If you believe that legend." He said the
Torah, the first five books of the Old Testament, includes stories
that predate Abraham, the father of Judaism, by 1,500 years, in
essence challenging the Torah's validity.
Goldman told of an Israel in which Arabs live, work and trade in
peace.
She spoke of the suffering imposed upon the Arabs by Israelis during
the attacks or responses (again, depending on one's perspective).
"I agree, they are suffering terribly," Goldman said. "Guess who
succeeded in bombing Ashkelon? Who brings it on themselves? Hamas
does, for its own people."
Elmassian quoted former Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin calling
Palestinians "insects that have to be crushed." (Begin's actual quote
read: "We are as different from the inferior races as they are from
insects.")
Goldman spoke of the reasons Israelis must defend themselves and
criticized Hamas for destroying holy sites in Ashkelon.
"Throw rocks, and you'll get rocks back," she said, though rockets
are more like it.
Their arguments predate them both. The question is, will it ever
stop?
"How can we solve the problem between the Palestine and Israel?"
Goldman asked. "Where no children are killed, where no holy sites are
destroyed?"
It's continued for thousands of years. It's something world leaders
haven't been able to settle in the past 60 years.
Mostly, these two explained the passionate feelings that have
prevented a true peace in Palestine.
They did so without guns, rockets or car bombs. By historical
standards, it was a pretty good first meeting.