Today, sadly, the Canadian delegation left Gaza. As far as I have heard they made it out of Gaza which is very good news. I am now staying with the Codepink student group which consists mostly of Americans, although there is also another Canadian and a Norwegian. There was a Palestinian, but she was turned away at the border as she had a new passport that did not have the Egypt visa in it. Most of the students are studying at AUC in Cairo, usually Arabic or political science of some sort.
I met them when they were meeting with the former chief of police (their program is much more structured then ours, and sometimes in lecture format). We then went to Al Azhar University for a tour and a presentation put on by the students there. It was really well articulated and well put together - clearly a lot of effort. The presentation sparked a rather heated discussion mostly between the delegation and the students, as although the university is considered to be a moderate institution, their aggression towards Israelis was marked. While understandable, the discussion revolved around what type of response Palestinians would be best off to take. While of course I would advocate for non-violent resistance on their part (with accountability being held by Israel), I felt uncomfortable coming from the outside and telling them what I think they should do. The debate finally subsided peacefully but it sparked discussion and thought for the rest of the day within our group.
Before our next meeting we were able to go to the beach and put our feet in (well, some people, for lack of bathingsuits, went in fully clothed). It's incredible that a few metres away lay bullet holes and demolished buildings, and yet on the beach Gaza is beautiful. I think that with the difficult things we are seeing and with the emotions running high, it's really important that we take the time to recognize the beauty that remains in this land.
We then met with a political science professor and a director of a human rights centre. I learned a lot from their opinions - they believed that one of the reasons that Egypt isn't more supportive of Palestine, aside from the US influence, is because Egypt fears that Hamas's ties with the Muslim Brotherhood Association would spread to Egypt, and therefore Hamas failing needs to be shown as an example of what will happen if that type of party takes power. We also learned that Hamas, because of the mixed voting system, has only 44% of the popular vote but 67% of the seats. And while Hamas is a fundamentalist group itself, the horrendous conditions of Gaza are inherently breeding fundamentalism and extremism.
What continues to amaze me about this land is how generous the people are when they have relatively nothing. Many of the keffiyeh that the Palestinian students were wearing were given to our students, and I received two Palestinian flag pins as good will gestures. One young woman, after I commented on how cute her smiling cartoon-like moon ring was (it's hard to explain lol), promptly offered it to me and wouldn't take no for an answer. In return I gave her a fake silver band I had - I felt badly as it was a cheap little thing, but she was thrilled, as was I. The peace and community present in the majority of Palestinians here should be a model for us at home.
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