Page 54 - Signs of the End

18 THE SIGNS OF THE END

Levitt's interview with Mayor Jameel S. Khalaf, a major theme
w as uncertainty. Even one so centrally placed in the coming
situation seemed surprised by it, and Mayor Khalaf would only
stress his sincere concern for his community. Holding office
since 1981, the Mayor seemed only to want to preserve the status
quo of relatively peaceful relations with the nearby settlers and
with Israel in general. Jericho is "quiet," he said. But he clearly
could not predict any better than anyone else the real fate of his
small but increasingly important city.

MAN ON THE STREET

While it was very instructive and important to interview
some of the leaders and official commentators about the peace
agreement, it was equally significant to interview the "man on
the street" on all sides of the subject. We were able to get on-the-
spot opinions from quite a number of Israelis and Arabs at the
rallies and on Ben Yehuda Street in Jerusalem.

The Israelis

We detected mostly an attitude of guarded optimism among
most of the Jewish people we interviewed on the street. They
were hopeful the peace agreement would work and felt it was
time to have peace in the country after so many years of stress,
terrorism and outright war. But even these were apprehensive
of the genuineness of the peace, and were wary of the intentions
of the Arabs. Several expressed a concern that the Palestinians
and Arabs nations would not keep their end of the agreement
and that this would lead to more trouble in the future.

The most disturbed Jewish interviewees we talked to were
the settlers who had come into Jerusalem for the protest rallies.
They were very emotional in their concern about what might
happen to them in their West Bank settlements. They felt that
the suburbs in Judea, Samaria and Gaza that they had spent
several years in building up were about to be abandoned to the
"good graces" of the new Palestinian administration. Some were
determined to defend their home neighborhoods no matter what,