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Christmas Eve dinner, Falafel in Nablus. The owner of this place lived in the United States for years until a few years ago when things looked to be cooling down in his homeland. So he came home and than Ariel Sharon ignited the current Intifada and life became not so easy at all. Of course he knew there were risks but the the strength of his desire to return home was greater than appeal of life in America.

Listening to him further instilled in me something I had learned so vividly having been a refugee who lived two months in a Dutch refugee camp; refugees who are all too often so maligned in Europe generally have no desire to be anywhere other than their homeland. They are compelled to leave their homelands for fear of violence or lack of income and all too often this is because of the policies of our "democratic" governments.

The fact is that most people will always choose to live in or near where they are born and raised and when life there is bearable they would never think to come to rainy England or Holland or wherever; they would rather be home. But the Western (mis)understanding is largely lost on this fact. I wanted him to be part of the book but he reluctantly said no for fear of retribution.