Ramadan: hopes but less hope
As in every year, colored lamps decorated the top of Damascus Gate marking the start of the holy month of Ramadan. Peddlers took positions in the newly-erected market just outside Damascus Gate and each yelling with the usual claim that his merchandise is not only the best, but also the cheapest. Fruits, vegetables, cheap electronic gadgets and simple clothes are on sale in this market which, in the month of Ramadan, becomes perhaps the busiest part of the Jerusalem markets. The relatively low prices paid for goods bought in this market draw quite a big number of potential buyers. Yet many of them complain that their income is too limited for them to buy everything they see or like.
Sweets, mainly oriental, are traditional in the holy month and not a single meal is presented without the Katayef, a special pastry filled with cheese and covered with sweet sauce after it is baked for 15 minutes. "I wait for this month throughout the whole year," said Imad, owner of one of dozens of Katayef shops in the city. He said his income in the month of Ramadan is sometimes more than what he earns during the rest of the year.
He opens up his shop before dawn, prepares the pastry and by seven in the morning, people start to queue outside his shop, each waiting for his turn. By the time Imad shuts his shop, he is totally exhausted. "I go back home, have my first meal after the fast is broken, watch television for some time and then go to bed. I wake up before the dawn prayer, have a light meal, pray and then go to my shop," he said and stressed that this routine goes along with him for the full month of Ramadan.
Outside Imad's shop, stood some 15 people, all waiting to buy his famous Katayef. One would scream at the other asking him to stay in the queue. A woman would plead saying her child is at home alone and that she needs to be back soon. An old man would tell a story to the one next to him. All looked so bizarre, yet very traditional and normal in a market area anywhere in the Middle East From time to time, a political discussion starts to show that consensus among the Palestinians is sometimes impossible to obtain.
"To hell with this peace process. What good has it brought to us apart from perpetuating Jerusalem's isolation from the rest of the West Bank," shouted the 40-year old man who was second in the queue in waiting. "I have never imagined our condition to be as bad as it is today. The PNA is impotent and cannot do anything due to the fact that it is tied with the interim agreements. Neither the Israeli government have any intention of moving forward at all. We are stuck here with the Israeli occupation and no one can even tell what will happen tomorrow or the day after."
Another young man who wasn't that far from him was reading a Hebrew newspaper and chatting to his "neighbor" in the queue but without moving his eyes from the paper. "Don't you know it is impolite to talk to people while you read?" the man asked him. Looking from over his glasses, the young man replied: "Sorry but I am reading an interesting report in today's paper about a proposal by the Israeli chief rabbi during the 1967 war who suggested that 100 kilograms of explosives be put inside the Al Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock to blow them up."
The young man was referring to a report on a dialogue that took place on June 7, 1967 between chief rabbi Shlomo Goren and Uzi Narkiss, then commander of the central district in the Israeli army, who died last week. Narkiss had told the reporter how Goren approached him after Israeli soldiers took over the Old City of Jerusalem and suggested to blow up the two mosques "in order to finish with this question of Islamic control of the Temple Mount." Narkiss, who gave the interview provided the content not be published unless after death of both men involved in it, rejected the offer and even warned the rabbi with detention if he repeated his proposal. Goren died some years ago.
When the young man finished reading the article, he briefed his "audience" causing a mixture of feelings among them. One said: "Thank God this plot never happened otherwise we would have been left without the holiest shrine in Islam after Mecca and Medina." Another one replied: "You must be wrong. I wish they did it. At least we might have had the whole Arab and Islamic worlds united against Israel. But as this appalling attack never took place some of the Arab and Islamic countries still can afford to have peace with Israel."
Inside the walls of the Old City, the beefed-up Israeli police force contributed only to less business than expected in Ramadan. Shop owners in the market area within the walls complained of the worst business they have had over a number of years noting that people have refrained from shopping inside the Old City.
"I have a brother who lives in one of the Jerusalem neighborhoods outside the Old City and he rarely visits my shop. He says he prefers to do his shopping outside the walls where it is easier for him to park his car and to run away if something happens," said a vegetable seller who noted that once his brother got caught between crowd when Israeli police used tear gas canisters to disperse demonstrators, and since then he has had a breathing problem.