Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
this town is still notorious in Palestine for its gossiping. Even news less important than the
coming of the Messiah spreads fast from Beit Sahour.)
That evening, back at my Bethlehem hotel, I bumped into a dozen Lutheran pastors in
the lobby. They were heading into the 2,000-year-old cave upon which the hotel was built
for a devotional service. They invited me along. Even though I was really tired, I followed
my travel ethic: If an opportunity presents itself, say “Yes.” I climbed down into the cave
with them and enjoyed a wonderful hour of singing, reading, and sharing. It was, simply,
beautiful. You meet far fewer tourists in the West Bank than elsewhere, but those you do
meet are really interesting.
As long as I've been politically active (since my first trip to Central America back in the
Contra/Sandinista days), I've been impressed by how land issues are so fundamental to
peace with justice. And land—it seems to me—is what the struggles in the Holy Land are
all about.
Two hot-button land issues dominate much of the debate: Israel's erection of a barrier
around the West Bank, and the Israeli construction of settlements within West Bank territ-
ory. In an effort to get a balanced-as-possible take, I made a point to talk with people on
both sides (physically and philosophically) of this divide.
