Happy New Year!

Last week, on Christmas day, I was studying in the library. Today, New Years Day, I am also studying in the library. I had class yesterday and I have class today. I don't actually mind studying on holidays. If I was with family it would probably bother me. As it is, I don't have much better things to do with my time other than study.

Yesterday, for my international law class, we took a day tour to Jerusalem to visit the security fence/separation wall between Palestine/The West Bank and Israel. The man who gave us the tour was one of the leaders of the project to build this fence. What a unique experience!

We learned that the reason it is more accurate to call it a fence rather than a wall is that the cement wall portion is only 5% of the entire thing. The rest of it, 95%, is a fence, not a wall. It's a very smart fence. Apparently it detects any movement near it, cameras then look to the spot where movement is detected and soldiers can then see if it was a child chasing his ball or someone trying to cross. 

We learned all the ways they tried to keep Israelis safe during the Second Intifada before resorting to building the wall. We also learned about the mind-numbing and pain-staking detail with which everything seemed to be done. These details included a disassembly plan so that the wall can come down as quickly as possible when it is deemed safe. There were debates, visits to the Vatican city, and calls from the White House to determine the exact meter upon which the fence should sit.

My brain is still trying to comprehend the difficulty of this project. I am also appreciating that our tour guide, one of the chief architects of the whole thing, hopes to pull down the first section of the cement portion of the fence as soon as peace is made.