Religion, Nationalism, and Terror

Dancers at Cosmos club in the West Bank.

Credit: Katherine Kiviat

Nissenbaum Blog: Checkpoint Jerusalem, November 26, 2007

Ladies up in here tonight
No fighting, no fighting
We got the refugees up in here
No fighting, no fighting
- Shakira, featuring Wyclef Jean, “Hips Don’t Lie”

In theory, the 2.5 million Palestinians in the West Bank are brothers and sisters with the 1.5 million Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

In reality, the gap between the two has probably never been wider.

Most Palestinians who live in the West Bank have never been to Gaza, and most Palestinians in Gaza have never been to the West Bank.

Gaza, now under Hamas control, is substantially more conservative than the West Bank.

That reality hit home Saturday night around 2 a.m. while grooving to Shakira on the dance floor at Cosmos, the West Bank’s only real disco.

The dance floor was packed. Women in short leopard-skin mini skirts and thigh-high leather boots with spiked heels were doing the shimmy-and-shake with their partners as strobe lights and smoke swept across the club. Two, young, thin gay Palestinians with spiked punk rock-style hair and matching black t-shirts felt free enough to get their groove on on the dance floor.

The DJ unartfully careened from Shakira to classic Egyptian dance tunes to Nancy Ajram to cheesy American disco classics, but no one really seemed to mind.

The bar served up a steady stream of vodka and Red Bull, Taybeh (the only Palestinian beer), and a traditional selection of cocktails.Cosmos

You see this across the Middle East in places like Beirut and Dubai. But not so much here in the West Bank. And certainly not these days in the Gaza Strip.

Being at Cosmos 48 hours after attending a sparsely-attended rap show in Gaza City made me acutely aware of the growing psychological gap between the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

The chances for couples to dance together in Gaza are virtually nil. And forget about serving alcohol. There are no restaurants in Gaza that serve booze and even those that serve non-alcoholic beer sometimes get stern looks from customers who think it’s really the Devil’s Brew.

The rift between the West Bank and Gaza has become more pronounced in the nearly six months since Hamas seized control of Gaza.

Scores of Palestinians, the few allowed out by Israel, fled to the West Bank where they became refugees again in their own nation.

Many were scorned as traitors or cowards for fleeing. Others from Gaza were shocked by the sight of Palestinian girls dressed in tight jeans and pink DKNY tops seen shopping every day in downtown Ramallah.

On the eve of Annapolis, Gaza remains under effective lock-down. And there is little reason to believe that things will get better after the peace conference.

If Annapolis leads to ongoing peace talks, there will be no incentive for PA President Mahmoud Abbas to renew talks with Hamas and create a new unity government - a move that would no doubt scuttle negotiations with Israel.

If Hamas decides to renew attacks on Israel after Annapolis, Israel is certain to respond with overpowering force in Gaza that would probably have at least the tacit backing from Abbas.

In a few days, Israel is planning to turn the screws again on Gaza by rationing power - a move widely viewed as a violation of international law.

“This is our life,” a friend of mine in Gaza told me last week. “Your life was better than your father’s, and your father’s life was better than his father’s life, yes? Here, my father’s life was better than mine, and my life will be better than my son’s.”