MIDDLE EAST: Where East doesn’t meet West

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The massive concrete barrier snaking through the West Bank may get most of the attention, but an equally formidable wall exists in the minds of the residents of Jerusalem.

Last week, I attempted to set up an interview with representatives from the international aid organization Save The Children. The simple act of agreeing where to meet was a sobering lesson in the invisible barriers that have become a part of daily life here.

“I’m new in town,” I told their spokesman over the phone. “But just give me the address and I should be able to find your office.”

“Well, we’re in East Jerusalem and the streets here don’t really have names or signs,” he said.

“Umm ... OK. Well, is there a nearby landmark so I can tell the cabdriver?”

He almost laughed; the request was so naïve. “You’re coming from West Jerusalem, right? Most taxi drivers from the west won’t come to East Jerusalem.”

Friends tell me of leftist, peacenik Israeli friends -- strong supporters of Palestinian rights -- who nonetheless speak of Arab East Jerusalem as an impossibly exotic and dangerous place. It’s not prejudice, they say, as much as an unspoken taboo combined with (perhaps justified) fear of a hostile reception.

One journalist here once tried to meet an Israeli source who absolutely refused to go to East Jerusalem. So he instead arranged to meet in the lobby of a five-star hotel, at which point he told the source: “By the way, you know you’re in East Jerusalem now, right?”

— Ashraf Khalil in Jerusalem