A Quaker Journey to Palestine

Frank Massey

One thing that happened on the plane over—an Israeli said, “Oh, you’re going to the territories. Are you going to have guards?” I never felt safer. In Ramallah, people recognized us, and I think they knew that we were associated with the Friends school, and so we were treated very warmly everywhere we went.

I grew up in the 60s in eastern North Carolina, in the shadow of Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, which had B-52s flying out of there fully loaded during the Vietnam era. But I grew up Quaker—several generations. I’d always known about my dad being a conscientious objector in the Second World War. Then I also learned that my great-grandfather received an induction notice from the Confederate Army, and he refused to go. So they arrested him. He didn’t believe in fighting. He was Quaker. He didn’t believe in owning enslaved people, because he was Quaker. And so that has helped form who I am and how I go about living—this knowledge that violence doesn’t get us anywhere.

In 2003, during the second intifada, Friends United Meeting, which is the official sponsor of the Ramallah Friends School, wanted to take a group of Friends over to be supportive of the school. As the general secretary of Baltimore Yearly Meeting, they invited me to go.

Friends education started in 1869 with Eli and Sybil Jones from New England Yearly Meeting, who felt called to go and start an educational facility for girls in Palestine at that time. The school is known as a Quaker environment—equality, peace. It’s living out the Quaker testimonies right there in the middle of a very tense situation.

So it had been 20 years since I’d been there, and I knew a lot had changed. Standing in line before they let us through the airport—you’re nervous. On the news we had just heard that some other international olive harvesters who had come in to help were arrested and deported by Israeli forces. But we were able to get to the Ramallah Friends School, where we were going to stay a couple of nights. I was very relaxed. I put down my bags and went walking almost immediately.

On Monday we were out at the farm. We were pruning the olive trees. We were helping to install solar panels because they don’t have electricity. We were doing all kinds of maintenance work that the farm really needed. It was really great to hear the story of Daoud Nasser. The farm has been in his family since the Ottoman Empire. They’ve had settlers come onto their property to tear down some of their olive trees. Daoud said, “We’re not going to be the victim. We’re going to operate from a place of love. If you’re a victim, you’re talking about revenge and violence—that’s not what we are.” And so they set about replanting the olives that were torn up.

On Sunday we went to the Ramallah meeting for worship. There was one young man who stood up and shared a message in Arabic. I didn’t understand the words, but I understood the spirit. I felt the spirit and the power of the spoken words, even though I couldn’t understand them. I felt a warmth within that was almost as though I was lifted up. I could not stay in my seat. I was lifted up to share a message.

Walking around Ramallah, look at people in the eyes—maybe seeing the soul of the other person, the goodness within the other person, the light within the other person—that we’re all one. That we’re all brothers and sisters and that we have to love one another. Afterwards he came up to me and said, “Do you understand Arabic?” Come to find out, our messages were very much the same.

For me, that’s the universal message. I’m trying to share that as I talk about what’s going on. I’ve been down to talk to my senators, and I’ve been doing some work to raise money for the Ramallah Friends School. Sometimes I fall into the trap of saying there’s too much to do, so I don’t do anything—but I do my little bit and encourage other people to do their little bit, and maybe we can make a difference.