April 3, 2002

The President

The White House

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue

Washington, DC, USA.

Mr. President:

I am writing to you from the Middle East, from a small town called Ramallah (as big as Georgetown in DC where I studied and worked for five years), in a country we hope will one day be called Palestine.

For days neither I nor my husband have been able to go to work. My three-year-old daughter has not gone to her nursery. Garbage in my town has remained uncollected. Soldiers burst into my neighbor’s home, destroyed the furniture and stole $2,500 in cash. My brother-in-law lived for 5 days without electricity, heating or telephone. One of my co workers at a small art center I run has had his 20-year-old brother arrested by soldiers in the middle of the night and taken to God only knows where. Their home was ransacked in the process.

By the way, the freely elected leader of my people has been isolated from the outside world and encircled for six days. In another little town called Bethlehem, were Jesus Christ was born 2002 years ago, dozens of civilians, priests, and bishops have been encircled for two days in the Church of the Nativity. A few yards away the corpses of two people killed by gunfire lie in their home, among a family which is unable to remove them for burial.

These are not scenes from a post apocalyptic "Mad Max" style movie, but real life, taking place in the third month of the fourth year of the 21st century, in full view of CNN and Fox News and ABC and CBS, and NBC, etc.. I am writing from Palestine, once the land of peace, now the setting for a string of ghettos, its inhabitants regularly repressed, killed, exiled and imprisoned.

I am writing to you Mr. President, to ask why hundreds of us cannot drive for miles on open roads, go to a concert in another town, forget about politics, have career and retirement plans and celebrate joyful Independence Day instead of wondering whether my daughter will have a future.

Best regards,

Adila Laidi,

Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center Director,

Ramallah, Palestine.

Http://www.sakakini.org.