Vignettes of Nablus

Abstract

A road map would show that Nablus is only 60 kilometers north of Jerusalem, but it is really much farther than that. Across a political fault line, from the calm to the storm, the road from Jerusalem to Nablus leads to the crucible of the intifada in the West Bank. The journey itself takes a long 50 minutes, as the car hugs the perilous two-lane road snaking up and down the ridge of hills and plateaus that form the spine of the West Bank. The hillsides are stone-terraced from top to bottom with olive trees, whose silvery-green leaves flutter and dance in the October breezes. A month from now, these hills, lonely now except for the occasional shepherd and his sheep, will be alive with people, as entire Palestinian villages flock to harvest the black olives hanging fat and heavy on the branches. Closer to Nablus, the topography of the road view changes perceptibly. Israeli civilian settlements command many of the hilltops, dominating the surrounding countryside with their rows of stone-quarried, Swisschateau housing encased behind floodlit fencing. The olive trees on the hillsides beneath the settlements have been uprooted, leaving only the empty stone terraces as a reminder of the hills' former life. After passing through several Israeli army roadblocks, we coast down a last hill and into sight of the two barren mountains between which Nablus lies, Gerizim and Ibal, sprawling over the landscape like sleeping giants. Today, I am making one of my final trips to Nablus. October is an exhilarating time to travel through the West Bank. Not only do the ripening olive trees make the parched landscape greener, but the magnificent culumus clouds