Yousuf explains to his uncle Tariq that is going "bye bye" on the horse
posted by Laila @ Thursday, June 02, 2005
Raising Yousuf and Noor: diary of a Palestinian mother
I am a Palestinian from Gaza. I am a journalist. I am a mother. I am a Muslim. This blog is about the trials of raising my children between spaces and identities; displacement and occupation; and everything that entails from potty training to border crossings. My husband is a Palestinian refugee denied his right of return to Palestine, and thus OUR right to family life. Together, we endure a lot, and the personal becomes political. This is our story.
About Me
- Name: Laila
- Location: somewhere between the seas, Gaza Strip, Palestine
Journalist, mom, occupied Palestinian-all packed into one.
Previous Posts
- Relax, your'e under occupation.
- Chips and charcoal..not a good combination
- Its a bird, its a plane...its an Israeli Apache
- Trouble at the (Syrian) border
- To Baalbeck...and beyond
- And in between...
- After!
- Before...
- and off we go...again
- Happy birthday!!
Favorite blogs
Thursday, June 02, 2005
Yousuf explains to his uncle Tariq that is going "bye bye" on the horse
1 Comments:
Hi Layla. My name is Gavriel. I found your blog via a post in a 3rd party at semitism.net who chose, for whatever reason, to compare our two blogs.
I'd like to start with the safe but thoroughly obvious point that you have an incredibly cute baby, which I'm sure you know.
These are pointless words, I'm sure, but I really do hope Yousuf won't have to live his life under occupation. Despite the impression you would get if you read my blog and its terror-centric view of life here, I am not one who wishes you ill, and I do believe there are people of good will on both sides.
I worry though, because those people don't get so much air time to reassure their compatriots on the other side--the so-called trust building. I would love to think that blogs and the internet could somehow overcome this gap at some point and help build the grassroots connections that both sides need to bring their peoples as a whole to a readiness for peace, more specifically, a readiness to consider the costs of peace, since most of us believe we've been ready for peace for a long time. I'm sure it will take even more time, I just pray it happens.
In the meantime, despite my support for "apartheid walls" and checkpoints (under certain circumstances), I hope I could convey to you that I don't want to blind myself to the pain suffered by good people. Better still, at the risk of exposing my naivete, I would much prefer we all live in peace, as neighbors, someday.
I would invite you to read my blog from time to time. I'm sure you will disagree with virtually every conclusion I draw, even though we both start from the same facts. My great fear though, is that you would be insulted by many of my posts. That is not what I wanted to accomplish with blogging, but it is easy to drift into certain patterns when you get no feedback, or only rah-rah way-to-go comments (good for the ego, limiting for the worldview).
I would hope that knowing others who don't share my worldview might nevertheless read my words will remind me to try harder to let my best shine through. I can't promise I'd be able to totally lay off the sarcastic and biting commentary, but I'd like to think I'd be better. I don't think either of us could convince the other to suddenly realize the error of his/her opinions (although your writing is very good), and I won't try to do that here. I'd just like to see each side understand the other, just the first step.
If the semitism.net post has drawn me uninvited into what is intended to be a "family blog", please accept my apologies.
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