While death and destruction, chaos and fear exist all around, I took a sweet girl and her mother from Tarkumia checkpoint to Sheba Hospital near Tel Aviv (with Road to Recovery, (with Road to Recovery, “an Israeli Association of volunteers who drive Palestinian patients – primarily children – from checkpoints in the West Bank and Gaza for life-saving treatments in Israeli hospitals”).
We drove on roads usually packed at this time of the day. They were empty. We laughed, we talked a little English, a little Arabic, a little Hebrew.
When we arrived at the entrance to the Pediatric Department, this sweet girl came up to me and put her arms around my legs. I got a hug. I wish I could show you a photo of her.
I’ve been criticized for just about everything — for being naive, for being patronizing, for paying lip service, for not taking a firm stand one way or another.
This IS my stand. This is my answer to what has been happening all over this region, a smalk tikkun olam in a broken world.
Photo by Joanna Chen
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