A Tale of Zebra in Gaza and Donkeys in Islamabad

This is the story of a donkey that was changed into a make believe zebra in a hard hit Gaza zoo. Little does the zoo keeper know that in Islamabad and indeed all over Pakistan we have perfected this art. Examples of this fine art can be witnessed in the provincial and national assembles and are not confined to these institutions only ~t

GAZA—Something didn't quite look right about the zebra, but it was hard to say exactly what. Of the several ramshackle zoos in Gaza, Marah, located not far from the Bureij refugee camp, is by far the cheeriest: The animals are lively, the enclosures clean, and children gather around the cage of a resting lion.

"It's really a painted donkey," admitted Mahmud Berghat, the director of Marah, when asked about the creature. Making a fake zebra isn't easy—henna didn't work and wood paint was deemed inhumane, so they finally settled on human hair dye. "We cut its hair short and then painted the stripes," Berghat explained behind the closed door of his office. Donkey BusinessThe only zebra in Gaza.By Sharon Weinberger