Home Sweet Home?

Home Sweet Home.

Is leaving your country a betrayal to it? Is it really a betrayal when you are trying to pursue a better life? Many seem to think that it is. They ask why is it that they can manage to live in this country. They face the same problems that we do. A good example of someone who thought like that was Raja Shehadeh grandfather’s cousin Abu Ameen: “His cousins were all useless. They wanted to study and after finishing school they left to pursue their education in the United States.” (Palestinian Walks, 21). Abu Ameen didn’t care about his education, he cared about his land. Focusing on making a living in Palestine and to make it more beautiful.
I remember the trip to Battier. We were going up on the beautiful mountains after lunch in order to plant olive trees. Everyone was in a group and we had shovels to dig up the dirt to make room for us to plant the trees. After we were done with planting our trees, we put on it a white cardboard box and we signed our names on it. It was a great feeling knowing we were helping make our country more beautiful.
This feeling was intensified after we had made our way down in order to go home. I saw a fellow student talking to an old man. The old man was wondering who we were and what were we doing there. The student told him about what we have done. The old man thanked us and praised us for what we have done. It was a wonderful feeling to know that I was a part of something special.
We all want to make our country more beautiful and to never leave it but some of us simply have no choice in the matter. I read in an article called Spaces of Suspension about a man named Salim Shawamre who first lived in Om Alshagaf but was forced to leave to Anata after Israelis soldiers destroyed Om Alshagaf. Salim tried to acquire a permit in order to build a house on the land that Salim owns. Salim built his house three times but it was destroyed because they said he did not have a permit. Salim went again to acquire a permit but they proclaimed to have lost his file, so Salim built his house again without a permit and the Israelis destroyed it once again.
I have also been with my fellow classmates to a place called Tormosayya where we talked to a man who said that eighty percent of its inhabitants have left Tormosayya to live in the United States. That was a really surprising number once I visited Tormosayya. It was so beautiful. The houses, the mountains that could be seen there. Its sight stuck with me, I even wished that I could live there. Hizmah is not as beautiful as Tormosayya but I also feel horrible that we have to move. However, there are many problems that have to be dealt with.
There is also the issue of passports. Some do not have an Israeli passport, and they have to keep leaving it in order to renew their visas. Its money consuming and its not the way anyone wants to live their life. Education is also another reason for people moving out of their country. Parents in Palestine feel that their kids would have a better education in America.
I think these are the major reasons for someone to move from their beloved homelands. No matter how wonderful and beautiful it is like Tormosayya and Bait Battier, people can not live imprison in their own homes. Some can’t even go to work without fearing for their lives every single day. Some would have to go through a longer route than it is necessary with all the walls and the checkpoints that is available pretty much everywhere.
I wish, and I’m sure many Palestinians wish, that we could live here without all these problems that they face every single day. Until then, many feel that immigration is the answer to their problems.