I’m not inventing anything. I just have decided to let others know.

I know, and maybe many readers have heard of it as well, Jewish-Palestinian couples usually always have a hard time, and few succeed to stay together. Pressure from our social environment and from our families are too often too big. Right a few days ago I spoke with a young man in Jerusalem about his story with a Jewish girl – that lasted a year until she gave in to her family pressuring her. There are studies made about the matter.

Yet, what I’m going through is surely one of the toughest stories. I don’t know yet how long our love-story will be allowed to last, but both of know that we have no future – absolutely none. We could (theoretically) stay together – but ONLY theoretically. The pressures we would have to resist would be much too big. Especially for him.

As it often happens, we met by accident and didn’t expect to fall in love at all – as we both know that the differences in our cultures, our background and our surroundings are way too big. But it happened nevertheless.

I’m Israeli having immigrated a long time ago from somewhere in Europe. He – I won’t say much about him, for obvious reasons – was born and grew up in the West Bank. I met him at the house of a common friend, in a place where I wasn’t supposed to be at all – according to the restrictions I am supposed to follow. But as I said before, I don’t care much about these inhuman and senseless restrictions of Area A, B, C. In fact, I don’t think they have any real legal basis – they are based on a military order and, what does it mean to divide a country into areas where one is allowed or not allowed to go? Basically I think that “legally” speaking all this is not more than a joke.

The Wall is a bit less “a joke”. To cross it without a permit when you’re Palestinian can be very costly. It can be a death sentence, if you’re caught on the fact and the Border Policeman is in a mood to shoot at you. It can simply cost you some kicks from some BP’s who catch you (and are in “good mood”) and a lift back to the other side of the Wall – to “your” side = to the West Bank. Or it can cost you month or years of prison, depending if you have been caught before and in which situation you are caught again.

Nevertheless, hundreds of Palestinians (maybe thousands, I don’t know the statistics about this) cross the Wall/Fence all the time to come to work in Israel. There is little work in Palestine, and even if the “illegal workers” will work here (= in Israel) in conditions that equal slavery and for a salary that seems unbelievably low to any Israeli – it’s still worth the risk for many.

So I had met him in forbidden territory for me. We had merely exchanged a few words about a common interest. That had been IT. But a few month later I suddenly got a phone call from him telling me that he was here in Jerusalem, working – illegally – and that he would like to meet me, simply because he didn’t know anyone else in Jerusalem, and then there was our common interest, about which it was worth to speak.

I took me a while to find the right time to meet him, also because he was very limited in his movements… He works 12 hours a day for a salary that was 4 times lower than the minimum salary legal for Israelis, without even counting the fact that 12 hours/day 7 days a week isn’t legal for Israelis either. And, most of all, he wasn’t supposed to leave his place of work AT ALL, the risk of being controlled routinely for “the color” of his ID (a blue ID being an Israeli ID, a green ID being a Palestinian ID and the holder needs to have a permit for being on Israeli territory) card being very high.

Border Police routinely controls ID’s in East Jerusalem’s public transport, in the streets of East Jerusalem, and in some places in West Jerusalem known for being frequented by “Arabs”, like Jaffa Rd. and it’s surroundings. Anyway – “Arabs” = Palestinians with Israeli citizenship or, in Jerusalem, with the “blue” ID and the special status of residents of Jerusalem are routinely stopped and controlled. Something that NEVER happens to Jewish Israelis.

Nevertheless, he is young and unable to stay for weeks and month confined in a house. So he took the risk to meet me in a place that we thought of as relatively safe. We met several times, our common interest guiding us to deep discussions until… well, one day, we discovered that we were attracted to each other and in love…

It would be a wonderful love-story which has been ongoing now for more than half a year – if he wasn’t here without a permit. We are bold, courageous – or one could say: “crazy” – once a week (in general) he comes to my flat where he stays for 24 hours, having succeed to get “one day off per week” from his employer (e.g. slavemaster).

Risk is everywhere. His employer risks a large fine for employing Palestinians without permit. I already spoke about the risks he exposes himself to. And I too, I risk a huge fine, maybe jail, if he was caught in my house. I’m sure that not many do what we are doing. The risks are just too high – normally. But unfortunately we really love each other and can’t just “forget” and stay away from each other.

And there seems to be no solution for us. God only knows how our love-story will end. Because we both know it is bound to end somehow.

While I am relatively free (except for the very serious legal troubles I risk), he is not. If he returns to the West Bank our relation is finished. He’d automatically return to his family and not only his family (which in Palestinian society comprises not only father, mother and siblings, but tons of cousins, uncles and the like as well) wouldn’t approve of our relation and force him to leave me, it is also illegal in Palestine for unmarried couples to meet. – Palestine is not Israel and is far from being Europe, where I grew up and which constitutes my cultural background – and marriage is excluded in advance by the pressure from his family.

You’re thinking of West Side Story or Romeo and Juliette? – One of my friends made this reference once in hearing our story. To be true, it doesn’t even make me smile – because actually it’s very close to such literature. It doesn’t make me smile because THIS is not literature, but my life.

The only solution would be that he finds work WITH permit – which is next to impossible under the present government and policies.

So no solution?
I don’t know. Truly, sometimes I hope for a miracle.
I often imagine that they (= the police, the Border Police) finds us. I know what will happen to him – 3 month of military jail at the least. And for me? I don’t really know – until now I did not have the courage to try to find out what exactly I risk, I just know that it’s much.

I imagine myself in court. My crime: having given shelter to a Palestinian without permit = automatically a terror-suspect. Having given shelter to an enemy. I have no illusions. The fact that he couldn’t kill a fly wouldn’t count AT ALL, because the role of these laws, as well as the role of the Separation Fence/Wall is not to prevent terror (as it is officially pretended), but to keep Palestinians out of Israel. My crime therefore is treason.

Being in love and wanting to live with a Palestinian is treason to the Jewish Israel.
And there aren’t many more serious crimes in this country – if at all…