Contradictions

I'm Palestinian. I'm American. I'm Israeli.

My father was born in Palestine.

I was born in Haifa, the same city in which my father was born, under the same sky, breathed in the same air, took my first steps on the same land, but in a different country - I was born in Israel.

I was raised in California, spoke fluent Hebrew, adopted an American accent, struggled with Arabic and tried to peice together the fragmented memories of what I still find myself thinking of as 'back home', while I danced the dabkeh, ate zaatar for breakfast and loved to recite poems by the late Mahmoud Darwish about a lost homeland.

I'm a walking contradiction.