Belonging is a fragile thing. It can feel like standing in two worlds at once — one that questions your right to exist, and one that demands you justify it. Living in Israel has taught me that home isn’t always a place of ease; sometimes it’s the only place you can hold your contradictions without apology.
There’s a heaviness that comes with being seen only through the lens of conflict. When people look at me and see a settler, a symbol, a side — they erase the small, ordinary things that make a life: walking the dog at dusk, buying tomatoes from the same man every week, sitting with friends who argue about everything and still hug goodbye. These are not the acts of conquerors. They’re the rhythms of people trying to live, to be decent, to stay human while the world insists on reducing them.
I think often about empathy — how narrow it becomes when filtered through politics. I wish more people would allow complexity to exist without immediately assigning guilt. It’s possible, I think, to mourn for others and still love your own.
Sometimes I wonder if that’s the quiet work of our generation: to keep loving a place that disappoints us, to keep fighting for a country that keeps breaking our hearts. To hold the grief of others without letting go of our own.
Maybe that’s what belonging really is — not comfort, but endurance. A kind of faith that insists on staying, even when it would be easier to turn away.
