Alice Fodor, 18, struggles to make sense of Western beliefs about the Middle East crisis.
When I was little being Jewish was all about dressing up and colouring in. We lit candles and told stories and said strange things in strange languages. We went to Israel every year at Passover and went to the sea and ate falafel and now we can’t go because we might die.
How can we think about peace like this? Zionism being compared with Nazism. "Thou shalt not kill" but don’t worry, it doesn’t include Israelis. The US with its list of nations to bomb, in the name of "peace".
Suicide bombers. It’s their desperation that gives them the right to kill innocent people. But of course, Israelis can’t be innocent. But what are they guilty of? Supporting Sharon and his government?
But it’s not so simple, is it? The Israelis aren’t the "goodies" and the Palestinians the "baddies" any more than the other way round. The Palestinians should not be living in refugee camps with no electricity or running water while down the road there are fountains and flowers. They should not have to appeal to charities in Britain and the US to get health care. And Israelis should not fear being blown up every time they get on a bus.
I used to unconditionally support Israel; my mum’s friends lived there, they are nice people so why should other Israelis not be? The land had been given to the Jews after the Second World War, at a time when the West was taking in few refugees from the remnants of European Jewish communities destroyed during the war.
But the creation of Israel created another set of refugees, who are similarly desperate. You’d think that a nation made up of people who’d fled persecution would try to avoid making others into refugees, wouldn’t you? Suddenly it got really hard to reconcile my support of Israel with my disgust at its government.
I am still emotionally attached to Israel but I am now more critical. I hope that the suicide bombings will come to an end but also hope that Israel will make the political and territorial sacrifices necessary. This is the only way that the Israelis and the Palestinians can build a lasting peace.