Life in Israel has changed dramatically since this Intifada started. Here Abe Chiswick, a member of Kvutsat Yovel tells his story on some of the recent events in Jerusalem...

Sunday, January 27, 2002

It was a gorgeous Jerusalem day, the sun was shinning and there were people out in the street. The temperature was at that in between point where you could not decide between putting on a hat and taking off a sweatshirt. I left the apartment around eleven to go run some errands. I needed to talk to our friend at the bank down town, get a new alarm clock, and some double-sided tape to hang a tapestry on the wall with. I like strolling through the side streets of Jerusalem enjoying the weather, watching the people, and the buildings.

As I passed Kikar Tzarfat walking along King George Street, there was a loud crack that reverberated through the air from far in the distance. My first instinct was to try and write it off as construction noises, but inside I knew that was a lie. Things were surprisingly normal for half a minute or so. Traffic continued on. Pedestrians continued on. The calm before the storm. Slowly things became eerily quiet, so quiet I could hear the tapping of the footsteps of my fellow pedestrians. Traffic had almost completely disappeared, and no one was talking. Maybe pretending they had heard nothing or hoping they had heard nothing, but knowing that something had happened, and because of the sudden lack of traffic, it must have been something.

The quiet lasted only a short while, and was broken by the wail of the ambulance sirens. Even after the ambulances started passing by, and there was the constant wail of multiple sirens piercing even the most stubborn mind, there were still people chatting aimlessly, waiting for busses, continuing on their way. I was part of that too. Walking towards the sirens, instead of away.

I slowed my pace, and tried to take in the scene. As I got closer, there were more and more people coming out of office buildings just to stand there and look down the street. What did they expect to see? Because they were not near anything they could see more on the television than on the street. Yet they still continued streaming out.

I found a public phone and called people to let them know I was ok. By the time I got off the phone, the police were already set up to redirect traffic. Against my better judgment, and reason, I continued in the direction of the commotion. I briefly considered trying to get close to the action. I might be able to help, or just to gawk. Maybe I could translate for someone who spoke English but not Hebrew. And suddenly I was worried for my own safety. Would an angry crowd turn on a heavily bearded young man? I was dressed like an American, but would that matter? Why was I more scared at that point of the crowd than of another bomb? None of what was going through my mind made any sense, so I continued on to the bank.

I walked to the bank is on King George Street a block or so from its intersection with Yaffo where the sirens were. As I walked up to the door, a bank manager was telling the security guard to lock the door because they were going to close early. I caught the door before it closed, asked the guard to let me in. He shook his head, and closed the door on me. I turned away from the door, not sure of which way to go. A short old woman

banged on the bank door, said something to the guard, and he opened the door for her and let her in. I looked at him with a `what the hell am I supposed to do now' look, and he let me into the bank. As I entered, I heard the same bank manager telling the hall that the bank was closing early for security reasons. It had little effect on me; I was just there to ask our friend at the bank if we could move the Shabbat dinner we had invited her to back two weeks. She was not at her usual desk, and the woman next to her said she was not in today, but would be there tomorrow.

I left the bank and stood on the sidewalk of King George Street contemplating my next move. There were people all over the place. Some were cuddled together in tears, some were on the bank of public phones, but most were staring off to the left in a daze. They were standing at bus stops as if any bus could get through the mass of police and ambulances that had gathered. Part of me wanted to yell at them for being so stupid.

I wanted to check out one of the cheep electronics stored in the area for alarm clocks, but after my encounter at the bank, I decided that there would be no open stores in the area. So I headed off the way I had come, back home.

King George Street was now completely empty except for the police cares parked in the middle of every intersection. For a while I walked undisturbed down the middle of it. Still there were people standing at bus stops expecting busses that could not come. Were they diluting themselves, or did they really not know what to do or where to go?

I turned down Azza Street, there was a hardware store there I could get the tape I wanted at. As I passed a small pizza place, I noticed a small crowd gathered around the television. I stepped inside. And there was the scene, live on the screen. It was no longer a collection of sirens at an intersection. There were pictures of laden stretchers being carried off, pictures of sappers in bomb disposal suits, pictures of policemen and women seemingly running in all directions in a mass of confusion. My perspective of the events of a few minutes ago changed from just some ambulances to people actually being hurt. The television could not add any more knowledge to what I knew already. There were some injured, numbers not known, severity not known. But it was real now. The anchor repeated what he did know, that a bomb went off about half an hour ago. It did not seem like that long. My sense of time was warped.

I stepped out of the pizza place and continued down the street. Every shop had either a television or a radio, and every television or radio had a small crowd. I crossed the street and went into a hardware store. I found what I wanted and handed the man behind the counter some money. What do you say to this stranger at a time like this with the radio in the background reporting live from the local hospitals? I managed to squeak out a `thank you' as he handed me my change.

By this point I had left the commercial areas behind and was now safely back in residential side streets. They were quiet and calm, but I knew that behind most of those doors there was someone glued to their television watching the events that were happening only a short walk away.

There were kids out in the street being crossing guards, and people going about their usual daily routine. As I was approaching home, I felt a drop of rain. At some point in the last hour the sun had disappeared, and it had started to drizzle. I was home now.