The Contribution of Women to Peace and Reconciliation

put in was the stone from the Berlin Wall. My husband said, you are not
allowed to bring in stones, remember, the Intifada is going on.
When I arrived at the bridge, I saw an Israeli soldier face to face for the
first time – with mixed feelings. I was happy to go to the land I had
dreamt of all my life. Everybody told me how wonderful it was. But I
was shocked at how the soldiers were checking my luggage, and how
they treated me, like an insect, without respect. This was after the Oslo
Treaty. I was unable to define my feelings about the soldiers.
On the bridge, the soldiers asked us to step out of the bus, and I looked
at one of them, and the thought flashed through my mind, “This man
has to be killed”. Then I woke up, and thought, what a crazy idea, just
enjoy coming home. My husband had accompanied me; he saw my feel -
ings and calmed me down. After these procedures, we found my
brother-in-law and went to Jericho. I expected to see the Dead Sea, but
I did not see it. I expected to see rich fields in the valley, but I did not
see that either and I started to become disappointed. This was not what
my grandmother and my mother had talked about, and I got calmer and
calmer, and did not say a word. My husband saw the tears in my eyes
and said: “What is with you? You are in Palestine!” I replied: “But this
is a desert; this is not the Palestine they have been talking about.” I had
expected to see green land and water on the way to Nablus, as my mother-in-law
had told me. All these mixed feelings made me start crying.
We reached Nablus, and the city was still full of soldiers. When we arrived
back home, I had forgotten all the disappointments. This was my
first encounter with my homeland. At that time, my father lived in
Vienna. When he called me I told him that this is not the land I had been
told about, and that I had expected.
We restarted our lives, we looked for jobs. The Intifada was still going
on, and there were no jobs. A few days after arrival, my husband was
arrested for several hours. We went to the city centre, trying to find
out where they had put him. Children threw stones at the soldiers, and
I was following my mother-in-law, like a child, running to a police station.
The men taken prisoner were there; and many women were in
the station, too, watching the soldiers. Meanwhile the soldiers were
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