When I was growing up, I watched
‘The Wild Thornberry’s’ and ‘Indiana Jones’. I always thought that Nigel
Thornberry and Indy were the most brilliant and perpetually optimistic
characters ever put to thought. I mean, how captivating would it be to travel
across seas to foreign lands all for the sake of exploration and discovery?
Danger and adventure for the pursuit of knowledge; it all seemed like a fantasy
but none the less all the more aspiring to live a similar life. So I dreamt
that one day I’d be the one making the great journey and crossing the unknown
void. I’m a ranch hand by trade but I know the ins and outs of what it means to
be an adventurer. I learned from my father the importance of caring for the
world we live in, while also being able to appreciate the absolute beauty it
has to offer. Paired with the tenacity to live better stories, I was ready to
discover what this world really has to offer. After receiving my Magellan
Scholarship, I was overwhelmed with emotion and inspiration to live the lives
of the heroes I grew up with. However, what I discovered along the way was that
I was my own adventurer, and I didn’t accomplish my initial agenda, but I did
take the road that was less traveled.
My Magellan Project initially was
simple: travel to Israel, take photos of Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, travel
back to the United States. What I discovered on my arrival to Jerusalem was
very obvious; nobody was fighting. I struggled to understand how the media could
portray the country as though it was falling apart, while here I was standing
in the center of a very hot, arid, but extremely hospitable city. I tried to
understand how all of this could be and the longer I stayed within the city,
the more clearly apparent, and extremely familiar, it all became. As a
contracted ROTC Cadet at Washington and Jefferson College, I’ve pledged to
serve the United States of America as a U.S. Army Officer for 8 years. Being
situationally aware is part of the career, and once I familiarized my
surroundings, I soon found that maybe there was a war going on here after all.
I looked at the country as though
I was conducting a military operation and soon I found myself changing my
assignment to a security studies analysis. I examined how the observable Israeli
security and military presence effect the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and how
it also effects the culture in whole. Every citizen, from the ages of 18-22, is
required to give service back to the country, whether that be through the Israeli
Defense Force or through the Israeli Police Force. That, when applied, creates
a culture of omniscient security. Each citizen, being a defender of his or her
nation, is trained and knowledgeable in military combative, tactics, and
operations. These citizens are trained to look for suspicious individuals and
unusual behavior. Since the inception of the state in 1948, the people of
Israel have consistently been under the threat, brought to the brink of, or at
war with foreign nations or international and domestic terrorist organizations.
In a sense, when you grow up in a society that’s culture itself is structured
under the principle of being highly defensive, you come to understand, and even
sympathize, how and why people live the way they do.
Terrorist cells and networks that
operate within the Palestinian territories conduct rocket strikes against
highly populated areas in Israel. Israel, in defense of this, has established a
complex network of surface to air missile systems known as the ‘Iron Dome’ to
counteract these rocket strikes. While traveling through the country, I
received alerts for rocket strikes occurring in the surrounding areas. After
roughly one month, the total number of strikes against the state was 19, all of
which were destroyed before hitting targets by the surface to air missile
systems. However, even for how concerning of an issue that was, I never felt
that my life was ever in danger. The collective security concerns in the area
and networks that are in place and being utilized by the Israeli military and
intelligence services, such as Mossad and the Israeli Defense Force, are some
of the most advanced systems in the world. Much like the United States with
regards to our intelligence and federal investigative teams, the Israeli’s stop
about 99.9% of the “traffic” (terrorist threats, plans, and attacks) that could
have occurred in a given year; it’s the 0.1% that makes the morning news. However,
if you were to go to the Golan Heights in the West Bank and stand on the
Mountains bordering Syria, you’d be able to see the black smoke rising from the
border towns that are being bombed in the civil war. Now if you find yourself
within Palestine, such as Ramallah or Bethlehem, you can find posters
presenting local martyrs who have died when trying to combat the Israelis. Of
course these men come from radical organizations and terrorist cells within
Palestine, because the majority of the Palestinian people believe that it has
become counterintuitive to resist the Israelis. Based on modern military
history, we can analyze why they might start to fight in the court rather than
the streets. Every time the Palestinian Authority, as a state actor not a
terrorist organization, launches an attack to combat the Israeli’s, Israel capitalizes
on the defense and expands its territory more into the West Bank. It’s become
apparent that if the West Bank is split into two separate areas, a two state
solution would be obsolete and a one state solution would have to be made. So based
on my military analysis, because Israel is seeking a one state solution rather
than a two state solution, I would launch an operation, starting in Jerusalem, straight
across the West Bank separating it into two territories. This, indefinitely,
would achieve Israel’s strategic goals.
As for another proposal, Jerusalem
should be transitioned into a city state monitored and secured by a
international council made up of arbitrators from Israel and Muslim and
Christian nations. This would result the removal of a multitude of embassies in
the city, but in essence create a sovereign religious state open to Muslims,
Jews, and Christians. It’s ironic to believe that Jerusalem is considered the ‘City
of Peace’ but has been conquered and reclaimed 31 times since its founding. Making
Jerusalem a city state would result in solving one of the many geopolitical
problems facing the conflict. I honestly believe that traveling to the state of
Israel and being able to sit down over a cup of coffee and discuss the present
crisis and issues facing the state with the very citizens who have seen the
face of war and the threat of it gave me more insight into the Israeli Palestinian
Conflict than any collegiate course could foster.
