Tonight I went to Palestine.

I knew what to expect.  I’d seen pictures since I was young, of a land ravaged by war.  A land controlled by Hamas.  A land of a people displaced.

Tonight I went to Palestine.

The first checkpoint saw big men with bigger guns wave us inside.  I say inside because the whole of the West Bank was surrounded by a 30 foot high wall, covered in barbed wire with a sniper tower every 1,000 meters.  It encircles the entirety of the West Bank.  This was a wall to keep things from coming out not from going in.

Tonight  I went to Palestine.

We drove inside.  At first it was everything to be expected.  Broken cars.  Trash on the side of the road. Then a bend of the road showed the rolling hills of the area.  Another turn showed a dance hall, with teens and parents dressed in Salsa dancing garb.  A brand new BMW pulled in front of us.  This wasn’t what I expected.

Tonight I went to Palestine?

We arrived at our event.  Immediately we were met with smiles and handshakes and whisked into a modern, five story building with a beautiful restaurant on the ground floor.  Food and drink and 40 people had been awaiting our arrival.  We began the networking.

I met a man who was heading up the world’s largest connected city project – $1.2 Billion, located in Palestine.  I met a man who had just received nearly $4 million from venture capitalists – the most outside funding in Palestinian history.  I met a woman whose family had returned to the area after building a new life for themselves in the US.  But they had given it up because it was time to return home.

Tonight I went to Palestine.  But it was not as I had been told.

After our event we asked if there was somewhere nearby we could get some food.  Before we could even blink everything had been taken care of.  A reservation had been made and a taxi was arranged for our return to Jerusalem.  A tour of a new local tech start up, the top floor of the largest building on the tallest hill in Ramallah, was set up.

At dinner, laughter ruled.  Stories of youth and love and loss and life were told over shisha and hummus and fatteh and mint tea.  The restaurant manager contributed to both stories and orders  The restaurant was filled with women at tables, by themselves, with their friends, with their families.  Some in hijab, some in jeans.  

Upon hearing it was my birthday the next day, a special dessert was ordered. Everyone shared.  A meal no one wanted to end came to a close.  Four people talking at a table.  Four new friends talking at a table.

Tonight I had to leave Palestine.

They paid for our dinner without us even knowing.  They walked us out to our waiting cab and we made plans to see each other again.  They paid for our cab without our knowing.

The ride back I was filled with joyous calm.  In all my years of travel I have never been met with such a level of warm welcoming.  Of not just hospitality but true happiness of making someone feel truly and completely at home.

The checkpoint changed all of that.  

Watching men and women being pulled out of their cars and frisked and searched.  Of getting through to the other end and once more seeing those walls, those guns, those turrets.  Of feeling the bubble of happiness shattered as the full reality of the place and circumstances I was witnessing hit me once more.

Tonight I cried for Palestine. And Israel. For an impossible situation from thousands of years of impossible situations.  For two people divided by a wall.

Tonight I went to Palestine.  Tomorrow I will not be the same.