A Young Palestinian Who Found Refuge in Israel
At age 12, Dor Shachar ran away from Gaza to live in Israel. What transpired was a journey that exposed a deep divide.
EXCERPTS:
Dor Shachar grew up as Aiman Abu Suboh in a Muslim family of five in the Gaza Strip city of Khan Yunis. At age 7, he was taught in school that he had to kill Jews. At the age of 12 1/2, he ran away from home and lived on a construction site in Israel. In an interview with The Epoch Times in Israel, Mr. Shachar tells his story.
Dor Shachar: When I started school, in first grade, for about a month, they taught us to write letters in Arabic and read. After a month, they began teaching us to kill Jews. They told us at school, "It's a great commandment to kill Jews because they took your land, and you will fight until the last drop of blood to regain the land." They explained to us that the land includes Jaffa, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, the entire country of Israel, basically.
I knew Jews who came to the market [in Khan Yunis] to shop. It was a time when there was no intifada, nothing; it was absolute quiet.
They told us in school that Jews have three legs, that they kill children, women, men, and the elderly. That once they were Muslims, but they turned into Jewish infidels, and the biggest commandment is to kill Jews. All the students in the class had to say, "In the name of religion, in the name of God, in the name of Mohammed of Islam—kill Jews."
I refused to accept this. All the kids in the class say "Itbah al-yahud," or slaughter the Jews. I asked the teacher to go to the restroom to wash my face because I really didn't feel well, and I just wanted to get out of that place. In response, he slapped me and took me to the principal's room, where he whispered something in his ear about me. The principal asked me to stand facing the wall and hit me on the back with a rubber hose. Then he told me to ask my dad to come with me to school the next day.
The next day, my dad came to school for a meeting with the principal. After about 10 minutes, my dad entered the classroom. He started hitting me and said, "Yes! We need to kill Jews."
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At the age of 19, I went to the police and said that I wasn't legal. They arrested me and took me to court. In court, I said that I had been in the country for seven years and that I wanted to convert. My adoptive father brought 250 signatures from the neighbors to show that they knew me and that I truly wanted to convert. But the judge didn't address it. He sentenced me to 45 days in prison plus 10 months of conditional release.
During the hearing before the judge, there were other Palestinians tied to me by our feet. We were linked to each other. They whispered in my ear, "Wait, wait, see what we will do to you."
I knew what they were capable of doing. They have one goal—to kill Jews. They took me to prison in Be'er Sheva [a city in Israel] with the other prisoners. I suffered severe beatings because the other prisoners were told that I wanted to become Jewish. The prison guards separated me and took me to a cell with the Jews. After prison, they deported me to Gaza.
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The Epoch Times: At this point, you see your family for the first time in seven years?
Mr. Shachar: Yes. They told me, "You bring shame to the family, and if you respected the family, you would have killed several Jews."
They told me that I wasn't their son. They accepted me because they respected the Palestinian police, not me. They told me to sleep on the roof, so I wouldn't talk to anyone. For a month, I was on the roof.
The Epoch Times: Did your mom also refer to you like that or just your dad?
Mr. Shachar: For women there, it's forbidden to speak, forbidden to interfere.
The Epoch Times: Meaning, your mom is there and doesn't say anything to you?
Mr. Shachar: Nothing. My mom didn't say anything to me. After a month, they kicked me out of the house. I was homeless in the streets of Khan Yunis. I encountered the Palestinian police, and they beat me. After a while, I started working at a construction site in Gaza. I saved money and escaped back to Israel.
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The Epoch Times: Are there others like you?
Mr. Shachar: Where are they? The Jewish people have a very short memory. Some 150 years ago, before the establishment of the State of Israel, Palestinians murdered Jews and raped women. Then they developed organizations like Fatah, the PLO, Tanzim, and Islamic Jihad. What about them? Why do we only talk about Hamas? They're all Hamas, but they go by different names. They all killed Jews.
Now, if you eliminate Hamas, the Islamic Jihad will come. If you eliminate Islamic Jihad, another organization will come. For all these factions, no matter what their names are, they have one common goal, and that's us, the Israeli Jews. They don't know how to distinguish between left and right. They don't care.
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The Epoch Times: Why do we hear from the IDF spokesperson that there are many Palestinians who want to leave Gaza and Hamas won't let them? Are they all driven by the goal of killing Jews?
Mr. Shachar: For the avoidance of doubt I'll say 1 percent. What we're witnessing is a religious war between Islam and Judaism. When we don't believe in Muhammad, we're considered infidels, and the punishment for infidels is death. We've seen where they've reached. They've reached Ofakim and Sderot (cities in Israel). Keep going like this, and within 10 years, they'll also reach Tel Aviv, I believe even less.
The Epoch Times: I'll ask this from a different angle. Let's say tomorrow Hamas is eliminated. Who will be the citizens left in Gaza in your view?
Mr. Shachar: Islamic Jihad. It's a different name, but the goal is the same.
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At age 12, Dor Shachar ran away from Gaza to live in Israel. What transpired was a journey that exposed a deep divide.
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