Let Us Eat and Drink to Peace Again and Again and Again

Let us eat and drink to peace again and again  and again

As the rich and famous gather
They eat the finest foods and drink the finest drinks
At 5-star hotels they gather dressed in their Sunday best while the throngs gush, as the photographers pop and journalists scribble
With pomp and ceremony they strut like peacocks as they talk of peace with broad smiles and most inspiring toasts

While back to where there is no peace
Israeli soldiers are shooting  and beating protesting families
A medieval siege on 1.5 million people turned into farm animals continues year after year
Violent arrests of children are made for throwing rocks after chasing them with military jeeps

But back at the hob-nob hotel Obama is all smiles
Back at the fancy hotel  standing on  million dollar carpet Abbas is all smiles
Back at the glittering hotel under the sparkling chandelier Netanyah is all smiles
Back in Bil'in kids are coughing from sprayed tear gas and tending wounds from steel bullets coated in rubber

You cannot make peace in a hotel, in a board room behind locked oak doors with handles of gold, or in front of the media all smiling and shaking hands
Peace is found in the dusty towns and villages under siege and surrounded by apartheid walls
Peace in the prisons where peace activists suffer under endless administrative detention
Peace is found in the middle of a closed military zone where blood is spilled and bones broken

But as the politicians eloquently expound on wide ideals and expansive hopes and dreams
Human beings far from the camera's reach and the journalists pen suffer most horrendously
Land is stolen, houses are confiscated, colonists will still come to steal more protected by the Israeli military
The plight of Palestine will continue unabated

When the pens are sheathed and the camera's lensed
As the politicians go home amid fanfare and expansive speeches about peace found and compromises wrung out
But the facts on the ground just stay the same
You see unlike everyone else the Palestinians have no where to go, they cannot escape home or embrace the peace they never see

 by michael hall