March 25, 2002

This morning, for some absurd reason, we woke up and watched the Oscars - live on MBC Arabic television. Before it was broadcast, though, they brought an Israeli documentary on 1948 which was then dubbed into Arabic. The absurd thing is that, with all of the claims of a tight-lipped or propaganda-fed Arab media, Arabs often see more perspectives on the story that the rest of the world does. The last thing we expected to see was an Israeli documentary, though...

The lights last night were part of an Israeli operation to surround Tubas, we learned this morning, but until now nothing has happened and our teachers and students arrived as usual.

The Roman Catholic Church sits in the middle of Jenin.

Marthame headed into Jenin to take care of some business - the taxis were using yet another round-about road (even for here) - it turned out that the municipality of Qabatia is working on the road that we used to take. Since they can't get their hands on any asphalt (usually imported from Israel), they are using iron frames and pouring cement for the entire length of the road.

Speculation abounds about whether or not Arafat will get to Beirut, but Reuters has published an English translation of the Arab Summit's resolution on the Palestinians. Maybe there is hope....