美国国家公共电台 NPR A Longtime Israeli-Palestinian Friendship Falls Apart

 

LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, HOST:

There are times when we can connect surprisingly deeply with someone and then never see them again - a missed connection. Eight years ago, when I was a correspondent in the Middle East, I did a story about two people - an Israeli, a woman named Dana, and a Palestinian, a man named Mohammed. They met when they were teenagers at a Seeds of Peace summer camp in the late 1990s in the United States. Both had lost family in the conflict, but they became friends and kept in touch by phone. She lived in Tel Aviv. He was in Gaza. Here's Mohammed Saqar back in 2010 when I met him.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED BROADCAST)

MOHAMMED SAQAR: When I was young, I started to think, OK, when I grow up, I become 25 or 26 or 30, I'm becoming a leader here. She is becoming a leader there. Then we can marry, you know, (laughter) so we can produce new people.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: And this is a young Dana Levy¹.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED BROADCAST)

DANA LEVY: His people are the enemy, and my people are his enemy, so we have to either decide not - to let it go and just be Mohammed and Dana, and that's it or Israeli and Palestinian, and that's it because we're supposed to hate each other, you know. But we don't. So we're just friends.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: That friendship, though, has not endured the test of time and war. We caught up with both of them. And we should tell you this is a missed connection. We could not reconnect, as you'll hear. I spoke² first with Dana.

We spoke in 2010. And back then, you were working at a salsa club. You were single, living in Tel Aviv. So let's catch up - tell me how life has changed for you.

LEVY: So I met my partner and we have a 2 1/2-year-old - little redhead. (Laughter). Now we're expecting our second child. I am now working in a high-tech³ company. We create motion graphic⁴ animation⁵ videos for Fortune 500 companies in the United States. It's a big jump up from managing the salsa club. (Laughter).

GARCIA-NAVARRO: So when was the last time you spoke with Mohammed?

LEVY: So it's been quite a while since I've heard from him.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Did you think about him at all, especially when - during these cycles of conflicts? Did you think about what may be happening?

LEVY: Of course. Yeah, of course. I think about him a lot. And actually, we talk about him a lot in my family. He had a very special relationship with my father, who is actually more conservative, like right wing. So they would have these very long conversations - political conversations on the phone that would get pretty heated at times. So yeah, he was, you know - he was a part of my life, and my family knew him.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Dana, Mohammed said he doesn't want to speak with you on the air. He says he doesn't believe any more that people who are enemies can put that aside, like you used to, and be just friends. What do you think about that?

LEVY: I can totally understand him. I think for him it was even more difficult because I think Palestinians are living in these settlements - like in these...

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Territories.

LEVY: ...Yeah, in the territories with no electricity and no water. Obviously, people are suffering. They're living hand-to-mouth. He is suffering more than I am for sure. I have no doubt about it. It's difficult for him to see me as that Dana that he remembers when we were just 14 and not see me as an Israeli who is causing all this pain to to him and his family.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Even though you aren't speaking with him directly, do you have a message for Mohammed?

LEVY: Wow. I just wish him well, and I hope his family is doing well and his parents. And his kids - I don't know how many kids he has now, but just that I hope he's doing well and to stay safe.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Dana, thank you so much.

LEVY: Thank you. Thank you very much.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: As you heard there, Mohammed did not want to speak directly to Dana. I reached him on a scratchy phone line in Khan Younis in the Gaza Strip. He's still an English teacher. He now has four children - all boys. And despite his dreams of studying abroad, he was never able to leave the Gaza Strip because of the restrictions⁶ on travel for Palestinians. He describes life in Gaza now as a catastrophe⁷.

SAQAR: People here die for nothing. The army and the soldiers kill people daily down here. They are dying of hunger also and poverty.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: He says, whatever his history with Dana, he can't speak to her anymore.

SAQAR: I must respect my people's suffering and be with their feelings. And I cannot do this.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Since I last spoke with him, there have been two bloody⁸ confrontations⁹ between the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip and Israel. Mohammed's children have grown up in the shadow of these wars and have suffered for it. Mohammed's oldest son has had reoccurring nightmares of a dead body he saw split in two - he says the result of an Israeli airstrike.

SAQAR: He was dreaming of stuff, like blood and dead people, and the dead people are moving, and they want to take him.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: Another son often wakes up screaming.

Mohammed confesses that he has kept up with Dana discretely¹⁰ on social media all these years.

SAQAR: I become very happy when I see that she's happy and she's fine.

GARCIA-NAVARRO: But he can't help but wonder at the fate of their respective children on opposite sides of a conflict that seems like it will never end. Whenever he thinks of Dana, he can't help but think of the future of her son.

SAQAR: I'm afraid he will go up one day and be an Israeli soldier and kill the innocent people here. But I still - I love him. I love him. It's very complicated.

(SOUNDBITE OF BONOBO'S "BLACK SANDS")

GARCIA-NAVARRO: That was Mohammed Saqar in Gaza and Dana Levy in Tel Aviv.

1 levy   

n.征收税或其他款项，征收额

参考例句：

• They levy a tax on him.他们向他征税。
• A direct food levy was imposed by the local government.地方政府征收了食品税。

2 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

3 high-tech   

adj.高科技的

参考例句：

• The economy is in the upswing which makes high-tech services in more demand too.经济在蓬勃发展，这就使对高科技服务的需求量也在加大。
• The quest of a cure for disease with high-tech has never ceased. 人们希望运用高科技治疗疾病的追求从未停止过。

4 graphic   

adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的

参考例句：

• The book gave a graphic description of the war.这本书生动地描述了战争的情况。
• Distinguish important text items in lists with graphic icons.用图标来区分重要的文本项。

5 animation   

n.活泼，兴奋，卡通片／动画片的制作

参考例句：

• They are full of animation as they talked about their childhood.当他们谈及童年的往事时都非常兴奋。
• The animation of China made a great progress.中国的卡通片制作取得很大发展。

6 restrictions   

约束( restriction的名词复数 )； 管制； 制约因素； 带限制性的条件（或规则）

参考例句：

• I found the restrictions irksome. 我对那些限制感到很烦。
• a snaggle of restrictions 杂乱无章的种种限制

7 catastrophe   

n.大灾难，大祸

参考例句：

• I owe it to you that I survived the catastrophe.亏得你我才大难不死。
• This is a catastrophe beyond human control.这是一场人类无法控制的灾难。

8 bloody   

adj.非常的的；流血的；残忍的；adv.很；vt.血染

参考例句：

• He got a bloody nose in the fight.他在打斗中被打得鼻子流血。
• He is a bloody fool.他是一个十足的笨蛋。

9 confrontations   

n.对抗，对抗的事物( confrontation的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• At times, this potential has escalated into actual confrontations. 有时，这一矛盾升级为实际的对抗。 来自英汉非文学 - 行政法
• These confrontations and uncertainties were bing played out for the first time on a global scale. 所有这一切对抗和不稳定，第一次在全球范围内得到充分的表演。 来自辞典例句

10 discretely   

分离地，离散地

参考例句：

• The mesh is the outcome of discretely decomposing the continuous space. 网格是对连续空间进行离散剖分的结果。
• The sensitive flesh must choose the product which discretely these mark sensitive flesh may use. 敏感型肌肤也要谨慎挑选那些标明敏感肌肤可以使用的产品。