We had an awesome guy come and talk to us and give us a lecture on the conflict. It was really informative, and really great. The guy's name was Danny Seideman. He's an Israeli Jew, but he is in favor of a Two-State Solution between Israel and Palestine, and is pretty brutally honest. He's not very biased, either. And he's Funny. It was a great morning.
We walked out to a lookout point just east of the center and looked over into the West Bank, over Perea and over the Dead Sea and Danny talked about how the main cause of conflict was Jerusalem and "Area E" (I belive is the name...). It's the area northeast of the Mount of Olives, and is a main area of conflict because it is a place of building of Israeli settlements. If they build up to Jerusalem, which they wanted to do for a while, then it would undermine the Two State Solution, by taking a slice out of the West Bank and cutting it in half.
This is Area E or what not, that is the problem area. The city off to the top right is the city in question.
This is a highway that is divided, as a solution to cutting off Palestine. They gave them 16 yards of pavement :)The other main area of concern is Old City Jerusalem and East Jerusalem. The differences come because Palestinians view these areas as part of the West Bank, and Israelis view them as part of Israel. It's a huge hot spot area. Danny called it "the hot spot of the big volcano waiting to erupt." Pretty good imagery.
This is the seven arches overlook...which was our first stop on our first field trip... We came full circle.
This is Danny...He did say one thing that really interested me, though. He said that Jerusalem is not a city of contention and difference, it's a fairly stable city, and is an example of cohabitation and cooperation. Because even though the different religions have their little bouts of contention...there are a ton of very, very religious groups who have extremely opposing views, and they coexist in a fairly small area for the most part. I found that interesting.
And then we went to a section of the wall... I'll just let most of the pictures speak for themselves.
Except this one... this is my new red coat :). Lyndsay took some fun pictures for me, and I'll post them sometime.
Anyway, I think I'm just going to say that, since I can't do the conflict justice in a blog post. I hope you enjoyed the pictures!
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