Dove's Eye View

Signs of Hope, One Year Later

More than a year has passed since I set up "Dove's Eye View" in the middle of the night, on a whim.

I was depressed in those days at all the terrible situations in the world, especially in Iraq and Palestine. Nothing seemed to be going right; my government caused or assisted in the suffering of far too many people. However, listening to critiques on the left began to wear on me. Everybody was angry, everybody criticized everybody, solutions seemed impossible. I wanted some hope.

Two sayings motivate me here at Dove's Eye View:

What you put your attention upon grows

and

I would rather be happy than right.

I believe that harboring resentments and fear only poisons me. Justified resentments are the worst. I may think I'm right and the other party is terribly, evilly wrong, but resentment just eats me up. So twice a day I make a list of those resentments and fears and give them up to That Power which surpasses all understanding.

In my political life it's hard to practice these principles. Dove's Eye View is good practice.

Since January 2004 I have blogged whatever positive signs I could find in the Middle East: tiny shoots of peace breaking out between individuals, institutions, groups. When no such shoots appeared, I blogged cultural matters, or environmental issues, or sustainable agriculture. Often I posted my favorite recipes, because when all else fails, there's always dinner.

The whole business seemed a fool's project. Back in November hope seemed a rare commodity on the world stage. More than once I asked myself (and my friends) why I bothered. Was I just wasting time? Meanwhile, my list of recipes kept growing, and every day the referral logs kept showing searches for hummous, tabbouli, kafta, and red lentil soup, as many as 25 such requests each day.

I can't quit blogging when so many yearn for kibbeh recipes!

Six months into my blogging career, in July 2004, I was diagnosed with breast cancer - lots of it, invasive, requiring surgery and chemotherapy. This crisis brought me the greatest joys of my life so far: outpourings of love and support from family, friends, neighbors, acquaintances, strangers. Facing the fear of an early death forced me to throw myself upon that Greater Source with even more abandon. There's nothing like cancer to make life taste delicious, every moment of it, the quotidian and the sublime. I had paid lip service to the idea that "I'm not in charge, all will be well" for years, but now I really got to practice it.

Making Amends

Some of you may have noticed that Tony and I are having a bit of back and forth.

Tony has brought up an issue that requires me to make amends.

Welcome to Tony's Friends

Ahlan wa Sahlan to all of you visiting me from Across the Bay. I don't normally link to this blog because its owner calls everybody by so many unkind names that I can't quite wade through his posts. He's not really talking the Dove's language. But my visitors are extremely welcome, even our friend Tony.

I am an opinionated Lebanese American in Oakland, California, who wants to see peace, justice, prosperity and environmental health in the Middle East. I aspire to the evenhandedness and fairmindedness of some of my friends (Jonathan Edelstein, are you listening?) but I don't always live up to it. Today, with the assassination of Rafik Hariri, I've been profoundly afraid of civil war enveloping my father's country yet again.

It's not very Dovish to start speculating on who did it - and I almost deleted my comments about it. But the Dove is human, not a saint. I believe that nobody in Lebanon wants this to happen, and probably most sane people among her neighbors don't want it either. The flurry of comments here and there on the topic reminds me that when I veer away from posting signs of hope, I get results I don't like - insults, flame wars, name calling. I don't like it, and I'm sorry for participating in it at all.

This blog is dedicated to signs of hope for peace in the Middle East and the world - if you'd like to offer your own signs of hope, we'd be very grateful.

Please feel that my house is your house, and enjoy your visit with me.

Best Arab Blogger

I just found out that I've been nominated for
Best Arab Blogger 2004 in the Expat, Personal Life, Politics and Palestine category.

Other nominees include the amazing Iraqi woman essayist of Baghdad Burning, who must win in several categories.

I'm testing how to add the Nomination XML thingie to my template. I think I'd have to upgrade (more $) so I may not bother.

Polling is closed, so it's not a campaign. but had I known earlier, I'd have asked for your vote - sure it's a high school style popularity contest but so what? In high school I only won orchestra awards, and none of them were juried by my peers. I'm really pleased and honored just to be nominated, and to share glory with some really terrific writers.

Check the site for winners. I like the whole exercise for introducing me to all manner of new blogs, some of them very good (and some of them typically bloggerish).

Note that I've added a more recent photo of myself, from November 2004. Since I'm the family photographer, portraits of me are rare. This one shows me after my hair began to fall out from chemotherapy. These days I'm mostly bald, with scanty eyebrows and lashes, and many new hats. Chemo will end late February, and the hair will come back.

Okay, enough about me. How about them Iraqi elections, huh? The Dove thinks any election is a sign of hope. More later - must go to bed.

Abu-Aardvark on Children and Tragedy

The political scientist Abu-Aardvark just posted a moving essay about fatherhood and his relationship to the news. It's a nuanced exploration, with much personal history, of how we deal with tragic news stories, and the conflict some of us feel between our own good lives and the suffering we know is out there.

Abu-Aardvark's essay is a great example of the best of blogging - topical, personal, with internet links to tsunami relief sites. Go read.

Nomad - the Blog

I'm adding Ziana at Nomad to the blog roll - she's on fire with cultural events of interest to Arab-Americans across the USA.

What this blog is about

Welcome to the new guests - I'm honored by your visit. As we say in the Middle East, our land and our people are yours: ahlan wa sahlan!

You may notice that not all the posts on this blog seem related to Middle East peace. The Dove looks for signs of hope, and because environmental issues keep her awake at night even more than the Middle East conflict, items related to progress in environmental restoration make the blog. Any other signs of scientific or other cooperation among Middle Eastern scholars, artists, or regular folks are also welcomed - please drop a note to leilasab at yahoo dot com.

Why the food posts? Food and cooking are fundamental pleasures that bind families to the land, to each other, and to their communities. All Semites love sharing food with guests. Among the Arabs, whether Muslim or Christian, it is a nearly sacred obligation. When the Dove feels too bleak about the news, she posts her favorite recipes. You will find them archived on the right hand side of the page.

What is going on with the Dove and her relatives, parents, ethnicity? Sometimes we hear about Southerners, sometimes we hear about Lebanese, there are rumors of a Jewish husband but his last name is Celtic. ??? New readers may need a scorecard to keep track.

A quick rundown: The Dove's father is a Lebanese Christian immigrant, with relatives spread out from Lebanon to Australia. Her mother is a Southern WASP whose family lives in Virginia, Texas and other parts. The Dove's father's Christian Lebanese village is right next door to a Muslim Palestinian refugee camp, built on what was once our family farmland. The Dove is married to a wonderful man who does bear a Scottish surname but is halachically Jewish, via his lovely mother, who has a large and supportive family. The Dove herself grew up in the Midwest and South, but spent many long summers and one school year in Lebanon as a child; also lived in Cairo, Egypt for a junior year in college. Full disclosure: a 4 year marriage to a Muslim Egyptian in her 20s gave her an inside view into upper class Cairene families, and an appreciation for secular modern Muslims and their relationship to Islam. Updated - thanks to Islamoyankee for asking me to clarify.

After a dozen years in New York City, the Dove moved to Oakland, California, where she remains in the bosom of her multi-cultural extended family. Our holidays begin in September with the Jewish New Year, run through the solstice with Hannukah and Christmas, and end in the springtime with back-to-back Passover and Easter celebrations.

You may wish to read Leila's Tikkun article for more background on her father's village and the conflict in Lebanon. See right side.

Hope this introduction helps the confused newcomers, and some old friends, follow the many branches of the Dove's perch.

Electronic Intifada: Diaries

The ei: Diaries posted at Electronic Intifada, while portraying horrific conflict, are a sign of hope. Why? Because the people take reporting into their own hands. Because Jews and Arabs contribute. These diaries are not "balanced reporting", they are true journals, and thus offer a personal, immediate view inside Palestine.

The Head Heeb

The Head Heeb kindly posted to my blog today, which reminds me to add him to my blog roll. We don't always agree with each other, but he calls himself a "militant moderate", as in
this post. Militant moderate is one label I want to wear.

Head Heeb's focus is quite wide, with discussion of Africa and human rights, as well as Middle East peace issues. I find his perspective invaluable. He also has great links to blogs I wouldn't have found otherwise.

Billmon on Weblogs

Billmon goes to Davos, attends a session on blogs.

Excerpt:

...communications technology may be moving in a great historical cycle. The invention of the printing press -- followed by radio and then television -- created a progressively more capital-intensive media industry, with an increasing division of labor among reporters, editors, printers, advertising whores, um, I mean, salesmen, etc. The invention of the Internet, however, has shifted the balance back towards the individual writer/publisher, doing his/her own thing, reporting or commenting on events they find through their own research, either on the web or off.

The difference, of course, is that what was once limited to a small literate elite in the 18th century is available to millions of people the world over in the 21st. This is a revolution by anybody's definition, and could even, in time, spell the end of the mainstream media as we know it. Or, as Rosen put it: "The age of the mass media is just that -- an age. It doesn't have to last forever."

...snip...blogs are doing more than just about any other modern institution (if institution is the right word for something as anarchistic as the blogosphere) to recreate a common communication space, and encourage maximum public participation.

Go read the whole article, even if you're new to all this blogging stuff. It's not just self-referential web geek chatter. This new form of communication is affecting our primary elections, the anti-war movement, and politics in general.