October 30, 2014--Time Wars

I hate it it when the clocks spring forward or fall back. I like my routines and this disrupts them.

Sunday they fall back when Daylight Savings Time ends. The worst of it is not a jet-lag-like hangover but the fact that it will be dark up here before 5:00 in the afternoon. Not my favorite thing; but we head for NYC early Sunday, and I suppose it will be light enough when we leave for us to see the first snow of the season that is forecast for then.

But over in the Middle East, as with virtually everything else, one more thing the Israelis and Palestinians aren't on the same page about is Daylight Savings Time.

The Palestinian Authority ended DST two days before Israel, out of stubbornness more than anything else, or as a pathetic declaration of independence, and so for those two days, those few workers allowed to cross the Gaza or West Bank border to get to jobs in Israel, going one way arrived, by the clock, at an earlier time that when they left and their return commute took an hour more of seeming clock time.

According to the New York Times, the website timeanddate.com reports that over the past 15 years the Palestinians and Israelis have changed time at the same time just seven times, for some unknown reason always when springing forward. Making matters even worse--which is difficult to achieve in that fraught region--three times it took a month before their clocks were in sync.

So here's my plan--

Forget entirely about Daylight Savings Time. I have confuted a decidedly unscientific survey and have found hardly anyone all that passionate about retaining it. They tell me that whatever time it is they get used to it. Even darkness in late December in northern places such as Maine that falls by mid afternoon.

On the other hand, I doubt Israel and Palestine would any more agree to this than settlement policy or work permits for Gazans. It seems the more things they have to disagree or fight about the better they like it.