What Israelis think....

By Shabbir A Bashar, PhD San Francisco Bay Area, US
21 September 2005, 18:00 PM
Only a few weeks ago a twenty something ex-Israeli army officer and his girlfriend helped me when I locked myself out my car -- for a fee. They came to California to visit and find part time work before going back to Israel for higher studies. One thing led to another and I showed them page 6 of my Bangladeshi passport, which famously states, valid for "all countries of the world except Israel". They chuckled. Amongst other things, we discussed suicide bombers; while the man was less forgiving, the young woman said that when people have nothing to lose and are treated like animals, people whose father or brother or mother or sister have been killed, people who have nothing left in life to lose they are easily persuaded to become suicide bombers. All three of us agreed that there are those on both sides who want to live in peace people like them and I who cried when Yitzhak Rabin was killed by fundamentalist Jewish terrorists. They have to let their voices be heard. I told them that one day when peace breaks out in that region, my country would probably recognise theirs and I could go and visit their country.

I feel that the Palestinian national flag flying high and proud from

Gaza is a step closer to that end.