I recently spent ten days on a religious pilgrimage in Israel. During
this
time I stayed in Tiberias on the Sea of Galilee and in Jerusalem. Places
visited included Nazareth, Bethlehem, the Golan, the River Jordan, the Dead
Sea, Tel Aviv, Mt. Carmel, Jaffa, and Jerusalem. As an old game warden
and
wildlife biologist, it is impossible for me to visit such places without
noticing the plants and animals and cultural manifestations like guns and
lifestyles. The following observations and lessons from this trip seemed
to
be worth sharing.
Environment:
Israel has a very intense and productive agriculture. They grow all
their
own food from dates and bananas to cattle and sheep. They even grow
enough
fruits and grains to trade them with Ukraine for coal to produce power.
The
orchards are completely covered with nets when fruiting begins to eliminate
losses to birds. Likewise, bananas are covered with bags as they fruit
to
prevent any loss to birds. Fish from the Mediterranean and from the Sea
of
Galilee are abundant on buffets and menus nationwide. Food prices are
reasonable. Since springs are practically nonexistent, cisterns and
runoff
ponds preserve rainfall. Black water heaters on roofs utilize sunlight
to
provide a ready and abundant source of hot water at little to no cost.
The
fields and pastures are well cared for and pleasing to the eye. Goats
and
sheep are everywhere from lush hillsides to barren deserts and even the
rocky ravines within Jerusalem. Flocks and herds are always tended by
shepherds and goatherds. Trees are nearly all hand-planted and only
found
on hillsides and rocky sites where alternatives are less useful. The
people
are well fed and society, while facing many enormous social problems, is
well-supported by it's harsh environment. All in all, it is like a State
such as Utah being managed to produce food and wood and animals on the order
of say Illinois or Iowa.
There are sparrow hawk-like raptors and woodpeckers and flickers in
abundance. Storks were migrating through the area during my visit.
Doves
(a bit larger than our mourning doves outnumbered the abundant barn pigeons
and English sparrows that were everywhere. The River Jordan has nutria
(a
South American rodent like a large muskrat) as well as gar and catfish and
carp that are probably (gasp!) Invasive Species.
Lesson #1:
Why isn't such a people-friendly environment to be envied? How silly
would
it be:
-to propose eliminating logging or any tree cutting, or
-to propose releasing leopards or wolves in the ravines of Jerusalem or
anywhere else, or
-to propose eliminating grazing of cattle or sheep or goats, or
-to close access and roads to public parks, or
-to declare no-fishing areas instead of fish management and use areas, or
-to propose the government own more land every year and close it to access,
use, and management, or
-to declare that only plant and animal species present when (Philistines?),
(Jews?), (Romans?), (Arabs?), (Crusaders?), (Turks?), (British?), or
(Israelis?) lived there are "Native" and all others are
"Invasive" and
objects of elimination no matter how costly, impractical, or impossible that
may be.
These very notions have weight and currency in the US today for reasons that
go undiscussed, unjustified, and that would not hold up in any candid
comparison of environmental benefit and support to our society and nation.
Guns:
All men and boys and unmarried women and girls (18+?) and older are in the
military. Young people in fatigues are everywhere waiting for buses,
walking along roads, courting in restaurants, and walking down streets with
fully automatic rifles with two loaded clips ready to go. Every
restaurant
and every hotel I entered had an employee (sometimes a burly young man, once
a really old guy from the kitchen, and once a young (16?) girl that weighed
110 lbs. in hip huggers that had been behind the desk the night before.
Every one of these people had a large (40+ caliber?) and loaded
semi-automatic pistol on their belt. While walking on streets I saw many
men and some women with telltale bulges from concealed handguns under
shirts, on ankles, and in handbags.
Lesson #2:
All these guns are possessed by every age of citizens in both rural and
urban settings. They are kept in homes and are certainly not all in
safes
with trigger locks. Why, if guns are inherently bad or dangerous as the
US
gun control lobby continually asserts, aren't kids killing fellow students
that tease them or holding up stores or creating a crime rate way above all
the disarmed European nations? Why aren't old people all committing
suicide
or neighbors shooting offensive neighbors or road rage shootings (yes they
have heavy traffic too) common?
Most Israelis are descended from the same cultures (European and Russian)
that most of us came from. What is the difference (other than the
ant-gun
socialist governments of Europe and other western "developed"
nations)
between Israel and the growing US misconception about guns being inherently
"bad"?
It was my impression that Israeli's are not having children out of wedlock,
there are not many children growing up with only one parent, families are
strong and extended (gramps and in-laws still "help out"), and the
TV is not
dripping with the sex and violence that is so common on US TV.
Despite UN hyperbole (to justify yet another Treaty) and US anti-gun
propaganda, guns play a major role in suppressing crime and terror in a
society like ours. Those who do not choose to have a gun owe a great
debt
to those that do assume the responsibility for carrying and being willing to
use a gun for the common good.
Culture & Tradition:
Bedouins are desert Arabs that live (among many other such places) in the
very barren "wilderness" between the Dead Sea and Jerusalem.
This is where
the parable of the Good Samaritan was set and the robbers almost killed the
traveler that the Samaritan helped and took to an Inn. It is barren and
rocky hills where a rabbit would probably have to pack a lunch and a
canteen.
Bedouin home sites occupy several of the small basins along the road into
Jerusalem. They are truly ramshackle shanty frameworks often walled with
plastic sheets. A camel and a donkey or two are tethered at the site and
small flocks of sheep or goats or both are tended by a young boy or old man,
generally within sight of the home site. As you approach Jerusalem, some
of
these Bedouin home sites are within sight of Arab villages with all the
modern conveniences on the hilltops overlooking the Bedouins.
How do Bedouins maintain their culture in such circumstances? How do
they
pass on and maintain their lifestyle to their young? How do they
preserve
their traditions in the midst of fickle and powerful social forces that
(like modern societies everywhere) seek to homogenize not only all people
but also their traditions and lifestyles to conform to what majorities feel
entitled to impose?
Lesson #3:
Bedouin cultural challenges must be basically similar to American hunters,
trappers, fishermen, ranchers, farmers, animal owners, loggers, and others
that are threatened by urban environmental extremists and animal rights
radicals. Although I saw none of the adamant hatred exuded by
environmentalists and animal rights organizations in the US directed toward
Bedouins in Israel, the common task of maintaining lifestyles, cultures, and
traditions is surely common between threatened Americans and Bedouins living
beneath modern villages. While governments and individuals appear to
decide
these issues, really it is the Bedouins themselves that fight for and
preserve their lifestyles and traditions. The first line of defense for
Bedouins concerned about their future has to be families continuing their
culture by first and foremost raising their children to know about and
defend their culture. The Bedouins appear to face an even greater
ultimate
threat than those of us slated for disappearance here in the US by active
forces constantly plotting our demise. If the Bedouins can continue, we
should be able to do no less given our communications and Constitution and
(short though it may be) 225 year history.
Lesson #4:
I learned a lot of things in Israel, none probably more important than the
importance of families. While we rightly rail in the US against the
radicals and bureaucrats and politicians; and we are correct to be concerned
about the growing abuses from Acts like Endangered Species, Animal Welfare,
Marine Mammals Protection, Wilderness, etc; they are all only symptoms of
what is wrong.
What is wrong is school teachers and daycare providers raising our kids.
What is wrong is kids left alone daily. What is wrong is unwed mothers
and
single parents in abundance. What is wrong is culturally corrosive media
and propaganda. What is wrong is government erosion of parental
responsibility and teachers that spew false and purposely misleading
ideologies to children who have been given no rational alternative.
I do not believe that the laws and philosophies rampant in the US today
(many of them cited above) could take hold in a society where moms and dads
and extended relatives loved and constantly nurtured their children.
Whether it is the hollow lies about guns or wilderness or the scientific
mumbo jumbo about "endangered" or "invasive" species,
there is no place for
these things to root if the kids have a head full of common sense and
cultural understanding when they are bombarded with the deceptions of our
society today. The Israelis and the Bedouins know this and one good look
at
their society should set us thinking about what is going wrong with ours.
Jim Beers
1 May 2005
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