Jerusalem Marathon

Mounted Police

This morning saw the Jerusalem Marathon underway. Crazy security issues. The entire eastern part of the Old City was closed off. And the marathon does not include inside the Old City. Yet our streets were blocaded, Damascus Gate and 2 other gates were closed, New Gate was empty because the main road was blocked off, even the train service stopped.

Water canon

Mounted police were at hand, hundreds of Border Police in riot gear, and metal barriers raised all over the Muslim Quarter. It was too much. A terrible exaggeration to treat all arabs as a threat. All people wanted was to continue to work and live ... but the closures today disrupted many things.

In fact since the previous evening, a curfew was issued for arabs in the Muslim Quarter to stay indoors. The street was deadly quiet when I passed by in the night on the way home from late work. A Border Policeman stopped me and told me to pull back my hood (it was cold). When I did, I took out my ID but he did not want to see it. He simply said "You speak arabic" and began questioning me in arabic. How in the world did he know that I spoke arabic?  The intelligence service here is scary!

Damascus Gate blocked off

But Friday muslim prayers went ahead with a fiery sermon by the Imam ... to a much smaller congregation at the Al Aqsa Mosque. Men below 45 yrs were prohibited from entering the Old City hence entering the Mosque. Anyway the marathon was won by a Kenyan in record time.

The only happy thing for me today was the opportunity to meet an old Druze friend who had gone to Canada to study. It was good to see him again.