I wanted to wait till I had the perfect picture to post with this blog entry, but I can't seem to get the right shot. Hopefully you can imagine what I'm talking about.

On a stretch of Hebron Road between Jerusalem and Bethlehem, there is a designated bus lane where buses can breeze by the lanes of traffic and drop off passengers without angering a line of cars behind them. I often ride the Arab buses from Bethlehem into Jerusalem, packed with hijab-covered women and their children, Arab men heading to work, and an occasional international. And then, I get the strangest sensation when our bus pulls up alongside an Egged bus heading in the other direction, packed with Orthodox Jews- women wearing headscarves and hats to cover their hair, men wearing black suits and large, black hats. As the buses pause, one next to the other, you catch a glimpse into the life of the other. The people on the other bus look  just as uncomfortable as I do squeezed onto the hot, smelly bus. You see the same children with their faces smashed up against the glass looking out onto the world. Occasionally I think, this must be what a shared Jerusalem looks like. Palestinians and Israelis, living side by side, peacefully coexisting on this stretch of bus lane in Jerusalem. They even sit next to each other on the bench at the bus stops.

Then I think about this a little more. Why are there two bus systems that drive on the same road and use the same stops, but are exclusive to one group of people? Why do I never, ever see an Israeli get on the bus with me? Why are these buses completely segregated? Why do the Palestinian buses get stopped and searched at checkpoints, while the Egged buses fly on through? Maybe these bus systems are not an example of a shared Jerusalem at all, but of the future for Israel, an apartheid state.