“The Security Fence”, “The Anti-terrorist Fence”, “The Separation Wall”. You can even call it “The Apartheid Wall” or “The Barrier”. It still doesn’t change the fact that the wall (as I call it) is one of the most extremist and fundamentalist ideas that someone in the defense office in Israel ever thought of. Despite this, there are some facts that some people choose to notice and others choose to ignore. Since the creation of the wall, the number of suicide bombers has decreased by more than 70 per cent. Yet, there is no proof that the wall is the real reason for this statistic. One can  argue that we have already witnessed a few breaks in the dynamic conflict of the Middle East. Therefore, as much as the idea of the wall looks warm and fuzzy in the short run, it is looking awfully cloudy in the long run. The wall does not ensure that in the future, when the conflict will get a bit warmer, to put it mildly, Israel will be a safe place to live in. My mother always told me that you cannot hide from your problems, problems won’t go away until you work them out. It is the same thing with the wall, The problem will not go away and it will overcome the wall. Then we will have to work it out.

But for now the wall is a fact and as long as the wall is there it is a must for the Israeli Government to understand that there is a way to build a wall and there is a way to introduce the idea of a wall to the world and especially to the Palestinian society. Building the wall doesn’t contradict justice as long as you are being thoughtful towards the Palestinian people and the Palestinian lands. Israel should show the world that for now, despite all, the wall is the best solution for both nations and that it is temporary. Israel should present to the world its own rulings (state court rulings) that defends the Palestinians lands and promotes equality.

It is a bit ironic that the global pressure, criticism and reactions to the construction of the wall were much more radical than the attitude towards the wall now being built along the U.S and Mexico border. The purposes of both walls are surely the same - using it as a defense line. In the American case, the Bush government used huge scary reasons such as “illegal immigration” and “drug problems” It may sound too optimistic, but as far as I can see, the day when the Berlin wall fell, at the start of the 90s is a symbol that will repeat itself here in the Middle East. I believe is not so far from now, not so far from our mind.

As long as there is hope and willingness from people from both sides to change, the day will come when we will see people from both sides of the wall coming to take it down. It happened in Germany. There is no reason why it will not happen here in the holy land.