Monday, April 04, 2011

More NYTimes Fiction

Isabel Kershner opens up her piece today thus

In the rolling hills of the northern West Bank, Palestinian villages and Israeli settlements exist in a geographical intimacy that belies decades of mutual hostility, suspicion and fear.

Here neighbors are also enemies, and the brutal killing of five members of the Fogel family in the settlement of Itamar three weeks ago has done nothing but harden that division.

What neighbors? What intimacy?  They don't permit us to live among them, even if we wanted.

This is the extent of that intimacy in her piece:

Although none of the residents of Awarta who were interviewed had ever set foot in Itamar, some settlers are familiar with Awarta. Some have visited at night, under the protection of the army, to pray at shrines traditionally believed to be the burial sites of the family of the biblical prophet Aaron.

She continues and quotes an Arwata resident:

Asad Abd al-Karim Lolah, 70, said it was “impossible for any Palestinian Muslim Arab to have committed that crime.”

And describes this:

The Palestinian Government Media Center took reporters to Awarta last week, primarily to highlight the damage wrought by the Israeli Army. Children cried and ran away in fright at the sight of strangers.

Here's her story on her visit to Itamar.

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