Hating me more than helping himself: A Jerusalem encounter that says it all

I’ve never seen anything like this in my life.

It happened on the roads leading toward the Old City in Jerusalem. The traffic was heavy, and two lanes on the left side were completely congested. Yet, the lane to the right, heading toward the city center, was wide open, completely empty.

In an attempt to save some time, I decided to move into the free lane. I was driving my car, and because the open lane was just 20 meters away and totally clear, I thought it would be reasonable to make the shift, even if it meant briefly driving 40 cm onto the sidewalk. I didn’t want to stand still for another 5 minutes when there was a clear way ahead.

But then, I saw him. A man driving a car, who had decided to occupy the empty lane by taking up 30 cm of space for no apparent reason. His car was blocking my way, and when I tried to merge, he refused to budge. He could have moved his car a mere 20 cm, but instead, he chose to remain still and block my path.

Taking a small risk, I decided to drive onto the sidewalk another 30 cm, making sure I could bypass him. That’s when it happened—he started screaming inside his car, though neither of us could hear a word, as both of our windows were closed. His face was contorted with anger, his head shaking uncontrollably, as if in a frenzy, as if he was having a mental breakdown, screaming at nothing, yet still intent on preventing me from passing.

I could hardly comprehend what I was witnessing. It made no sense. He was hurting no one but himself. His anger it didn’t stop me from passing. But his screaming and refusal to let me merge, despite the fact that I was causing him no harm, seemed to be driven by an irrational desire to disrupt, even if it was purely at his own expense. Eventually, I simply gave him the middle finger in front of his eyes and continued my drive.

The situation reminded me of something Golda Meir once said about the Israeli-Arab conflict: “The Arabs hate the Jews more than they love their children.”

As strange as it may sound, this encounter with a random Arab driver on the streets of Jerusalem served as a microcosm of the greater conflict between Jews and Arabs. The man screaming in his car held onto hatred and aggression, he didn’t care about solving the issue—he cared about resisting for the sake of resisting. In doing so, he harmed himself, his own peace, and even his own health, just to disrupt me in the most minor of ways.