Joanna Kessinger gets to come home Friday, which might not sound like a big deal until you realize she’s been a witness to the unrest in Israel for most of the past week.
The English Language Arts teacher at Emporia Middle School was a week into a trip to Israel — not for school but to follow the footsteps of Jesus, including the Mount of Beatitudes, Sea of Galilee, Bethlehem, Jerusalem and other sites. She says most people in that area of the Middle East — Israelis and Palestinians alike — are just looking for a good life.
Kessinger says there were no indications of anything brewing until things started unfolding this past weekend. Kessinger’s group was in Masada, near the Dead Sea on the eastern side of Israel.
The group was hustled off the mountain back to its hotel. Kessinger says officers and military personnel were prevalent through the weekend, and she received messages from former military officers advising her to evacuate before her flight out of Tel Aviv was canceled. Another concern: there were Palestinian and Israeli settlements on roads to different border crossings, and the fear was fighting would move into central Israel. Eventually, Kessinger’s group was able to go through an open crossing to Jordan.
Kessinger says she’s surprised by the amount of media attention she has received.
Kessinger says returning home will be “extremely overwhelming,” as you can imagine. She says she absolutely plans to return to the Middle East once the current situation settles down. She also plans to infuse her experiences into different lessons for upcoming classes.
Video by Chuck Samples/KVOE News
Photos by Joanna Kessinger