Jerusalem Day

Soldiers and students gathering
at Jaffa Gate for the marches

Helicopters flying low overhead this morning, mounted police everywhere, soldiers and police in every street corner of the Old City. It's Jerusalem Day again. There's alot of rhetoric about violence - jews against arabs, arabs against jews - but more likely it'll be calm with maybe a few scuffles. http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=270610 News just in - there were scuffles and small riotings around http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/palestinian-attacks-idf-soldier-during-jerusalem-day-event-in-west-bank-1.431485  Lots of marches by israelis in the muslim quarter ... some very provocative. I went to visit two sisters living up in Casa Nova but couldn't get home due to the blocks throughout the Muslim Quarter. managed to convince one soldier to let me through but got stuck in the second block. So was a polish sister and a couple of italian tourists. I got them to follow me as I brought them round another way ... to another block. Managed to convince the soldier to let us through so we could reach home. An Israeli guy in handcuffs was led past us at the block. There were tensions and fights at the 3rd Station.

Scuffles and arrests at 3rd Station

So it's in the news that 78% of East Jerusalemites (arabs) are below poverty line - so what's new? And it's all due to unemployment - so what's new? When people are poor and hungry and have no means to better their lives, they resort to violence as the only means to get their voices heard, their frustrations expressed, while they watch the western jerusalemites get wealthier.  http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/report-78-of-east-jerusalem-palestinians-live-in-poverty-1.431384  I think Jerusalem Day should not be a zionist glorification of conquest over the arabs, but a day to share the common wealth from west to east, to bring equality to both sides of the City. If the City is truly united, then it should not be just a political unity but an economic, social and cultural unity as well. But like everything here .... fat hopes.