September 10, 2002

Jenin and Qabatia are cut off from the rest of the area today. The school buses left Zababdeh to pick up the students, but found all of the roads closed - the road by the "abandoned" military camp, the round-a-bout road by way of Misilye, the "roads" that go between the olive trees...

These agricultural paths have become alternate transportation routes.

Calls poured in from various teachers and students and parents about the buses (the villages were open within their "boundaries", but not to outside traffic). One-tenth of our students and teachers were absent today - a heavy subbing load for a school our size. We were expecting the year to be like this, but we were also hoping that we would be proven wrong.

Meanwhile, the situation is "quiet" according to the news reports - guess we better re-learn what "quiet" means...Marthame filled in for the English teacher, who eventually managed to walk through the hills and olive orchards from Qabatia to Zababdeh. No one else arrived. Marthame switched over to subbing for the Arabic teacher (who didn't walk here from the other side of Jenin).

In the evening, Marthame walked around town to do some shopping and get his $2 haircut. The talk is all about Iraq and what the Bush Administration will do. Everyone here remembers the Gulf War and the impact on the Palestinian population - full curfew, even in places like Zababdeh, empty stores...after two years of near starvation and strangulation, how much more can the people here take? We have begun to make our contingency plans - not for fears of safety, or anti-American backlash, but rather from the sense we had last April that there's more that we can do with some freedom to move than locked up in a prison.

Unlike most of the people here, at least we have a choice. Prayers for our discernment are welcome.