On Saturday, October 7, 2023, I awoke to learn about the Hamas attacks against Israel and everything that followed. It caused me to cry. I chose to post an essay I wrote called “Cracks in the Wall” from a few years ago in light of the current state of the war. This passage is taken from my newly released book, The Condemned: A Memoir Told Through Selected Early Works of Short Stories, Essays, and Poetry, which was released on September 9, 2023.
I’ll let you read my story and come to your own conclusions.
Cracks in the Wall
It’s like living in a movie in America. Then, though, you visit Israel and the Middle East, where you encounter reality.
After eight years from that evening in a small hotel room with crossed knees pressed up against crossed knees and an acoustic guitar perched next to Amir’s lap, his words are still ringing in my ears.
I made my first trip to Israel in January 2009, during the height of Operation Cast Lead, also known as the Gaza Crisis. No one would discuss the horrific catastrophe inside the walls of Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. In the midst of the hyperbole that has come to haunt my beloved America in 2017, the lesson I gained on that trip is still resonating in my mind.
But eight years ago, as I sat in that hotel room, my thoughts wandered back to a few days earlier, as I stood on the brink of two worlds colliding, watching the sunset from the stone ground of an Israeli military post and looking over barbed wire into the West Bank.
focusing on the wall.
On top of a nearby hill stood a mosque that was covered in white purity and gave off a green aura from its crowning dome. Men’s evening prayers resounded throughout the hilltops in a captivating harmony as the warmth of the sunset enveloped the Arab hamlet, shielded by its towering mosque.
