Birzeit University, north of Ramallah. Photo: Pamela Olson www.pamolson.org

President Obama plans to visit Palestine in June in the quest for peace in the Middle East.  

An instructor at Birzeit University - the most prestigious university in Palestine - recently gave a class of English students an intriguing  assignment: after they had researched President Obama’s foreign policy on the Middle East, they were to compose a letter to him.

21-year old Salem Nazzal, who says he has been fascinated with the English language since he was a little child, took the assignment to heart in his letter, below:

Dear Mr. President:

First of all, I congratulate you on your new position. I congratulate you for the actualization of the American dream, the dream of black people and the dream of Martin Luther King Jr.

Sorry, Mr. President, I did not see the inauguration ceremony.  At that moment while you were being inaugurated, I was busy watching the war on Gaza and numbering the victims of children, mothers, and fathers.

You are one of the dreamers. You are the one who achieved the long held dream of the American black people who were suffering for hundreds of years ...

Palestinians also have a dream. I’m Palestinian.  I still have hope to get to my dream, to live in peace in an independent state as you have ...

But I wonder how to get that dream, knowing that you support Israel in everything — like the man who led America prior to you.  

During the war on Gaza you said, “Israel has the right to self-defense...”

What is the right you are talking about?

Is it the right to brutality or the right to kill children and steal lands in Gaza and the West Bank?

And you want more peace, but what kind of peace?

Is it like the peace that happened in Gaza before a few months (the war on Gaza)?

I think we got too much peace in the last war on Gaza. It is not enough or what?

In the final peace process a lot of children in Gaza lost their families and homes.

When somebody wants to take my home, do you think I will give up simply? No I will fight back.  What about you Mr. President? What are you going to do Mr. President? You will fight back exactly like us, as we do in Palestine.

The peace you are talking about is represented in arming Israel to overwhelm us by flashy peace bombs as happened in Gaza.

Anyway, let us go to the point that you really want peace and you are the president that we waited for. You want to visit Israel to discuss the situation for peace.

But prior to you, many American presidents came to make peace between both Palestine and Israel, but they failed.

Are you going to do the same? I hope you won't, and you won't disappoint me, because I believe you really want peace.

If you really want peace, withdraw American troops from Iraq, and Afghanistan.  Get them back home. In Iraq leave the land to its people and stop supporting Israel against Palestinians. Afterward the killing will stop.  

Mr. President you can be the one who makes unforgettable differences and memorable changes to be remembered forever. Mr. President you can make changes in the region if you really want.

Here I’m not asking you to bring troops to get back our stolen lands. I’m asking you to be clear, to stop Israel from stealing land and building new settlements, to put away all plans that were established by others, because these plans indeed won’t bring peace.

But if you choose one of these plans like “Annapolis” or “The Road Map” we will see more peace bombs, another war, and more homeless children and families.  

Mr. President we are humans just like you. We have two legs, two hands, and eyes. When you visit us you will see.

The thing which I cannot understand is why you are supporting and arming Israel, not Palestinians or Palestine, and for what?

Can you tell me Mr. President?

Is this because we don’t deserve life?

Mr. President I know your previous president left you a hard mission and many things to repair. I wish happiness and a good life for you, especially during your presidency.

Don’t forget we have a dream that I hope someday will come true. I hope this day comes in your time and then peace…peace.

Yours sincerely,

Salem Nazzal, student

Birzeit University

An American friend of the University instructor forwarded Salem’s heartfelt letter to a number of cyber-friends, as well as to Senator George Mitchell, Obama's special envoy for Middle East peace. Mitchell was also a peace broker for President Clinton in Northern Ireland. The former Senate Majority Leader was named to the post in January. CNN said, “The move could signal that Obama plans to get involved in the Mideast peace process early in his term.”

Ramallah. Photo credit: Pamela Olson www.pamolson.org

Salem lives in a small home in a rural town in Ramallah, just south of the university, with his parents and nine siblings. Birzeit University does not offer a major in English translation, so he hopes to further his studies in English by some other avenue.

Resources:

Special Envoy George Mitchell Kicks Off Mideast Peace Mission

click here Accessed April 28, 2009.

George Mitchell named special envoy for the Middle East click here Accessed April 28, 2009.

Pamela Olson, who generously provided the photographs of the university and of Ramallah, is currently working on a book entitled Fast Times in Palestine, a memoir about her experience living in the West Bank of the occupied Palestinian territories for 18 months. She says, “In the process, my worldview was torn to pieces, and in many ways my experiences were profoundly disillusioning. But the balance of my memories in Palestine are not just good -- they were some of the best times of my life. I emerged with much greater faith in the basic goodness of humanity and in the reasons to have genuine hopes for peace.” www.pamolson.org 

Author's Website: www.merylannbutler.com

Author's Bio: Meryl Ann Butler is an artist, author and educator who counts First Lady Dolley Payne Todd Madison as well as two signers of the Articles of Confederation among her ancestors. Mary Ball, mother of George Washington is in the ancestral lineage of Butler's great grandmother, Blanche Ball. Grateful to know that the blood of America's founding mothers and fathers runs in her veins, Butler has been newly filled with matriotism as a direct result of the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections. Lest she appear too uppity, it should be revealed that she also has family ties to James Butler Hickok, better known as Wild Bill. Butler has been actively engaged in utilizing the arts as stepping-stones toward joy-filled enlightenment for the past two decades. A native of NYC, her response to 9-11 was to pen an invitation to healing through creativity, entitled, "90-Minute Quilts: 15+ Projects You Can Stitch in an Afternoon" (Krause 2006). They don't call quilts "comforters" for nothing! www.90minutequilts.com Butler was faculty advisor for "The Love for All Mankind/Anti-Apartheid Quilt" project at ENMU (1993), now in the collection of the Hon. Nelson Mandela. As Arts Advisor for the Center for Improving U.S.- Soviet Relations (CIUSSR) Baltimore, MD; her activities included the "First U.S.-Soviet Childrens' Peace Quilt Exchange" (1987-88), an historic project chronicled in the media of both countries. Citizen diplomacy trips to the U.S.S.R. in 1987 and 1988 included lectures and presentations to fashion designers, craftspeople and artists in Odessa, Moscow, Kiev and St.Petersburg, in which she focused on the topic of creating global peace through international art exchanges. Butler is the proud mother of a daughter and seven stepchildren (all grown), and a passel o' grand younguns. It is to these new generations that she dedicates her political activism. Archived articles www.opednews.com/author/author1820.html Older archived articles, from before May 2005 are here.,

www.opednews.com/articles/Palestinian-Student-s-Hear-by-Meryl-Ann-Butler-090503-836.html