2 Students Defend Actions in Bethlehem

Two University of California students deported from Israel for entering Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity during the recent siege say they did so to try to relieve the suffering of the Palestinians inside and to protect them from injury or arrest.

Robert O’Neill, 21, and Nauman Zaidi, 26, who were released from Israeli custody this week and flown to the United States, were among about a dozen pro-Palestinian activists who rushed past Israeli soldiers on May 2 and joined Palestinians who sought refuge in the church.

The students said their actions were aimed at trying to peacefully end the standoff, not to prolong it, as Israeli officials have suggested. They spoke in telephone interviews from the East Coast, where they are staying with friends and relatives.

“We saw it as almost black and white,” said O’Neill, a UC Berkeley student from Claremont, of the activists’ decision to enter the church, carrying food and supplies. “Regardless of anyone’s political views, these people were starving. They were suffering and somebody had to do something.”

Israel views their behavior in similarly stark terms. Israeli officials said the young men’s actions helped militant Palestinians in the church and risked the lives of noncombatants inside. The two spent more than two weeks in Israeli custody after the siege ended and, under terms of their deportation, are prohibited from returning to Israel or territory it controls for the next decade.

“They broke Israeli law, they aided terrorists in what became a major standoff, and they put at risk the lives of innocent people,” said David Douek, spokesman for the Israeli Consulate in Los Angeles. “It’s a serious offense; it’s not like they were shoplifting.”

Zaidi, a UC Riverside student from Rancho Cucamonga, said he and the others hoped to prevent injury by standing between the Israelis outside the church and the Palestinians within.

“We were trying to achieve peace there,” he said.

Zaidi, a student of religion and environmental toxicology, and O’Neill, who is studying cultural anthropology and the Middle East, had spent the academic year in a UC overseas program at the American University of Cairo. Both said they plan to return to their home campuses this fall to complete their undergraduate degrees.

The two were notified by UC last week that they had been dropped from the overseas program for putting themselves in danger, a violation of the university’s rules. They also will have to re-enroll at their respective campuses, but university officials said that is just a formality.

They received good news from the university in Cairo on Tuesday, when counselors told them that they will be allowed to receive grades and credit for their coursework despite missing the final two weeks of class. They will not be required to return to Egypt.

“We’re getting a lot of support there,” O’Neill said of the American University of Cairo. “People seem to be pretty happy with what we did.”

Indeed, an assistant in the overseas program there said students had demonstrated in support of the activists. Egyptian media accounts also have applauded their actions.

“We understand how these young men feel and we can sympathize,” said the assistant, Dina Marks. “I think there’s a great deal of support for them.”

Nonetheless, she said, O’Neill and Zaidi had broken the rules of the program and “that’s why they’re in the situation they’re in.”

Zaidi and O’Neill, who earlier in the school year had made trips to the West Bank and Gaza Strip, decided to return over spring break to work with the International Solidarity Movement, a pro-Palestinian group.

Zaidi said that upon arrival in the West Bank, they went first to Ramallah and then to Hebron. There, they escorted Palestinians who they said were fearful of walking outside during Israel’s recent offensive.

“We worked well together. Both sides [Israelis and Palestinians] were interested in us, these two guys working together, since he has white skin and I have brown skin,” said Zaidi, who is of Pakistani origin. “We wanted to be liaisons, sort of intermediaries.”’

Then, when the solidarity group decided to try to send people into the church in Bethlehem, they opted to take their activism a step further.

O’Neill said some details of the church siege now seem blurry; he said he and the others were hungry when food supplies again ran low.

But he and Zaidi said they were struck by the generosity of those inside, who insisted that the activists have the largest portions. Zaidi also recalled the peaceful scene of the men, most of them Muslims, praying, their voices echoing through the vast space.

When the siege ended May 10, they and the other activists were taken first to Massiyahu Prison in the city of Ramle, then to a second, more restrictive facility, called Nitzan. There, they were held in cells apart from each other.

O’Neill said he was housed with Israeli prisoners, who he said were menacing until he shared food with them. Zaidi was housed with Israeli Arabs and had an easier time, he said.

Both students said they sympathize with the Palestinian cause. But Zaidi said his contacts with Israelis and Palestinians have now convinced him that both peoples want peace, but that their leaders and governments may be standing in the way.

“It’s sad. Both people want peace, but they’re scared of each other, for obvious reasons. They don’t know how to get there. We were trying to help,” he said.

Douek of the Israeli Consulate said the two students were at best naive. “If they were really sympathetic to the Palestinian cause, they wouldn’t be supporting terrorists. That’s what’s holding Palestinian society back, the support for terrorism.”

O’Neill doesn’t define his goals in those terms. He said he might want to work one day for the U.S. State Department, and try to change U.S policy in the Middle East, which he considers pro-Israeli.

“I think I could initiate a lot of change,” he said. “If every American just knew the realities on the ground over there, about what happens to the Palestinians under occupation, I think the U.S. policy would change tomorrow.”

Ed Dickens, a State Department spokesman, said he could not comment on U.S. policy in the region or O’Neill’s beliefs. Otherwise, he said, “I wish him the best of luck.”