FPI (Friends of Palestinians and Israelis)

Interfaith Report from NYC to Isr/Pal to US

2012-01-27T06:33:00.000-08:00

Ribbi Ammiel Hirsch reports on a Jewish, Muslim and Christian groups of religious leaders from NYC who spent five days in all parts of Isr/Pal. Here is his report. 1) The present status quo is not sustainable jumps out at you.
2) The need to bring hope to a situation that is hopeless.
3) We must turn enemies into friends, is the call of religious leaders

Turning Enemies Into Friends in Israel and the Palestinian Territories

Posted: 01/25/2012 4:38 pm on Huff Post

In early January, 15 senior rabbis, ministers and imams traveled together to Israel and the Palestinian territories. We are from among New York City's leading religious institutions. Collectively, our houses of worship are home to tens of thousands of prominent New Yorkers.

Anyone who appreciates the hectic schedules and unique demands upon congregational clergy realizes that it is no small matter to bring 15 spiritual leaders together for five days. So why did we leave our congregations for a week? Why did our congregants insist that we go and even pay for our mission?

In the post 9/11 world, religious rapprochement is no longer a luxury; it is a necessity. To ignore dialogue is to invite destruction. If we do not find ways to live together in dignity we will die together in agony. Religious moderates must build new bridges of coexistence or religious extremists will burn the last bridges of peace.

Our presence in the Middle East was intended to broadcast that we can live together, work together, travel together, dream together and build together. In a world awash in religious conflict, we wish to model a different way: the way of coexistence, respect and peace.

It was a tough trip. We did not paper over our differences. We visited the heart of the conflict. There were moments of despair. We met with presidents, prime ministers, members of parliament and mayors on both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian divide. We met with priests, imams and rabbis. We met with journalists, academics, students, villagers and farmers.

Daily headlines do not begin to tell the story. None of the people we met -- not one -- believed that the Middle East is closer to peace today than ten years ago. If this is the truth, we need to hear it. Progress rests upon the solid rock of reality, not the shifting sands of fantasy.

Despite it all, many of us returned to New York guardedly optimistic. None of the people we met -- not one -- felt that the status quo was sustainable. Everyone understood that a way must be found to break out of the suffocating reality. There is broad agreement that the present is not working and that a new future must be forged.

People of faith have a unique role to play. Both Israeli President Shimon Peres and Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad urged us to engage. Both of them emphasized that religion could be a source of enormous support as the politicians seek a political solution. We can help to create a context that is conducive to peace.

Religion specializes in hope. We are good at articulating our common humanity and giving voice to the better angels of our nature. We were also cautioned that if we do not step up the forces of religious intolerance will continue to drag the rest of us towards war. Our era has placed a sacred obligation on the forces and figures of religious moderation to speak out and act out.

There are many good people working to build bridges. In Haifa we met Christians, Muslims and Jews who have built a true house of coexistence. In Tel Aviv we met doctors, nurses and hospital staff who treated illness without regard to race, religion or creed. Even on the Gaza border, in Israeli towns that were fired upon in a barrage of missiles, there were people who were reaching out to the other side.

Peace is made piece by piece, from the bottom up. Progress is advanced day by day, person by person, each laboring in their own corner of the universe, connecting with others who together create an irresistible force. We should connect with those people and strengthen their hand. This daily labor is heroic work.

Jewish sages ask: Who is a hero? They respond: He who turns an enemy into a friend.

This is our task: person by person to help turn enemies into friends.

Musalaha Get at the Issues

2012-01-19T20:04:00.000-08:00

Dear Friend,

Our friend Salim Munayer works directly with Muslim, Jewish and Christian persons, to get at the underlying issues that wound and divide people in Israel/Palestine. Read his latest post and sense how real change is coming at the grass roots level. Thank you God for Salim and Musalaha. John Kleinheksel

A report on our Muslim-Christian women’s groups

We often share with you regarding our work between Palestinian Christians and Israeli Messianic Jews. But we have another area of work where we focus on bridge-building initiatives between Muslims, Christians, and Jews. In Romans 12, Paul calls us to live at peace with everyone. Our role as the salt of the earth requires us to reach out to our community and deal with the prejudice, offense and mending of relationships between us and others. Many times when the relationship between Muslims and Christians is highlighted in the news, we hear about clashes and conflict. In turn, we sometimes react with fear and suspicion of the other. In the face of religious and ethnic conflict, we often turn inward instead of turning outward and making overtures toward the other side.

Cardinal Francis Arinze addressed the issue of Christian-Muslim relations in an important talk given at the Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding in Georgetown University nearly 15 years ago. He emphasized that over half of the world’s population is either Christian or Muslim, and that a good relationship between the two matters not only to Christians and Muslims, but also the rest of the world. In short, he gave several guidelines for desirable relations between these two religious communities: 1) through better knowledge of the other, 2) acceptance of the other and respect for differences, 3) actual engagement in dialogue, 4) joint witness to shared values, and 5) joint promotion of peace.

He then detailed several obstacles and challenges: 1) the weight of the past, 2) lack of self-criticism, 3)manipulation of religion by politics, 4) religious fanaticism or extremism, 5) different approaches to human rights and especially to religious freedom, and reciprocity. Finally, he discussed some ways of meeting the challenges through: 1) healing of historical memories, 2) learning to exercise self-criticism, 3) liberating religion from political manipulation, 4) facing the phenomenon of religious extremism and 5) promoting religious freedom, 6) promotion of development and justice, 7) more attention to the spiritual dimension, 8) and joint concern over the use of the earth’s resources.

While Cardinal Arinze’s talk was addressing the global Christian and Muslim communities and we are working with a very specific and local group of participants, we have nevertheless found Cardinal Arinze’s talk instructive in our bridge-building initiatives. In this short report, we would like to share our recent observations of positive relationship-building encounters in recent meetings in Bethlehem between 25 Muslim and Christian women.

We met in the context of growing religious tension in the Israeli and Palestinian communities, and these women openly and candidly shared their perceptions of the other side. We observed that it was easier for the women to list the obstacles and challenges than it was for them to articulate the importance of having a good relationship between the two communities.

The women discussed the following obstacles and challenges:
· Mixed marriage – The Christian community of Bethlehem sees the marriage of Muslims and Christians in Bethlehem as very threatening to their small, minority community. Many Palestinian Christian men study overseas for a number of years, and some Christian women have begun to marry Muslim men. The Christian community sees Muslim men pursuing their women, but when there are instances of Christian men seeking to marry Muslim women, the Muslim reaction to this is much harsher than the Christian reaction to the opposite.

· Religious prejudice – Oftentimes Christians are not accepted to Muslim institutions (whether for work or for charity), while Christians are open to accepting Muslims into their charities and schools (but not as staff). Also, there is a new phenomenon where Christians in Bethlehem prefer to buy only from Christian vendors, and Muslims only from Muslim vendors.

· Exhibiting religious identity aggressively – Due to increased religious radicalism, people are beginning to show off their religious identity to the point that they are making the other side uncomfortable. For example, some Christian shops have so many crosses and icons hung up that Muslims feel that they are entering a church, not a store. Likewise, many Muslim shops are increasingly being decorated with verses from the Quran. Also, many Muslim women are dressing more conservatively as an outward expression of their religiosity.

· Outside propaganda – Religious channels on TV often broadcast Muslim and Christian shows from outside of the country that bring a message of intolerance, degrade the other religion, and often provide misinformation. This has a detrimental effect on the relationship of the local communities.

· Rise of Islamic political parties – In the past, national parties would bring both Christians and Muslims together. Now, religious parties are becoming increasingly prevalent, which results in excluding members of the community.

· Discrimination in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – The women discussed who the Israeli army favors more as evidenced in the number of permits Christians and Muslims receive. Some of the women wondered if this is a strategy of “divide and rule” or if this is the result of one side’s collaboration with Israel, a very serious accusation in Palestinian society. This affects the relationship between these two religious communities in Bethlehem.

· Historical narrative – Both sides emphasized the most hurtful parts of their narrative, which often exclude the other side. The Muslim women focused on the Crusades and colonization while the Christians focused on Arab expansion and various massacres, such as the Armenian massacre.

· Lack of information – Both sides lack knowledge and information of the other, as is seen in their understanding of one another’s religion and history.

In the beginning the women focused on how they hurt one another. When they began exploring their commonalities, they found that there are many areas where they can work with each other. Muslims and Christians in Bethlehem have many similar life challenges and can support each other if they have a relationship with one another. The women saw the need to strengthen the areas of commonality between them, readily acknowledging their responsibility toward their neighbors, and noted that it is important not to let outside sources influence their relationship.

What we gleaned from this meeting is that we have made progress in relationship building and communication, but there are still areas for growth and further discussion. We found the meeting to be promising as the women openly communicated with one another and listened to each side voice their perceptions. We were able to address some of Cardinal Arinze’s guidelines for desirable relations through beginning to get to know one another better, beginning to engage in dialogue, and realizing our shared life situation. The women renewed their commitment to meeting together as they realized their communication empowers them to be agents of change in their society, and helps them build bridges within their communities.

When faced with ethnic or religious conflict, we should engage with one another, listen to each other, and respectfully learn to make room for each other even when we do not agree on everything. We see this all the time in our reconciliation initiatives between believers, and many of these same principles hold true in our bridge-building initiatives between other segments of society. We are on a journey of reconciliation, and this journey is made with little steps in the right direction.

By Salim J. Munayer, PhD

Musalaha Director

The Case For Sanctions (Minus the US)

2012-01-06T19:48:00.000-08:00

Dear Friend,

Good Jew that he is, Henry Siegman strips away the illusion that Israel ever intends to give up the Occupied Territories if only the Palestinians will "recognize" the Jewish state (as they did as early as 1988).

He further strips away the illusion that the US would use its influence to get Israel to fulfill its promise to give up the Occupied Territories, thus abiding by international standards (no sign of this even under President Obama).

Since the Occupation continues unabated and the present conversations between the parties are in no way a reopening of the "peace process", Mr. Siegman comes to this startling conclusion:"I)nternational sanctions fairly applied to both parties for illegal and predatory behavior are no longer inconceivable" (last paragraph).

It is now clear that more and more UN Security Council members are willing to stand apart from and even agaisnt the US and consider boycotts, disinvestment and sanctions (BDS) against the Israeli state. Instead of being on the side of justice for the oppressed, the US is siding with the oppressors, to the wonderment and even disgust of the "international community" the US supposedly leads. The narratives continue to compete. As usual, the Israeli narrative prevails against a growing tide of disapproval, frustration, and impatience.

The Israeli lobby will be pressuring the United Methodist's National gathering and the PCUSA General Assembly this summer to desist from any talk of BDS. My own view is that the time has clearly come for us to begin talking in earnest about applying nonviolent BDS to the present untenable, unsustainable situation in Israel/Palestine. Unfortunately, we can't expect the US to lead any of these efforts for the present (as we reluctantly did viz a viz the S. African regime in the 1980s). Yours truly, JRK

The National Interest

January 6, 2012

The Mideast Peace Process in 2011: Hopes and Disillusionment

By Henry Siegman

This past December, four European countries—the United Kingdom, Germany, France and Portugal, all members of the UN Security Council—harshly faulted Israel for its violation of international law and the rights of the Palestinian people by continuing the expansion of illegal settlements in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. Israel’s intemperate response to that criticism exposed for all to see the moral and political obtuseness of its settlement policy, telling these European countries to mind their own business instead of interfering in Israel’s“internal” affairs.

The Israeli notion that the Occupied Territories beyond the 1967 border are “internal,”allowing Israeli governments to do with them as they please without regard for the rights of the Palestinian people or for international law, has not just “complicated” the peace process,as the United States and other governments have often put it. It has turned the peace process into a farce, for it exposes the strategic choice of Israel’s current and previous governments of territory over peace, and leaves no doubt that the goal of Israel’s settlement project is the prevention of Palestinian statehood.

Mostly ignored or forgotten is the fact that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ran on a Likud party platform that explicitly opposed Palestinian statehood; later, after he made his speech claiming to have been converted to acceptance of a two-state solution, key members of his government established the “Entire Land of Israel” parliamentary caucus whose official goal is the prevention of a Palestinian state anywhere in the West Bank. It is the largest of the Knesset’s many caucuses. There is no record of Netanyahu ever having criticized this caucus or having ordered members of his government to leave it.

Even as Netanyahu proclaims how desperately he wishes to renew peace talks with President Mahmoud Abbas, his government distributed hateful and defamatory accusations against Abbas, describing him as a “radical” who glorifies and perpetuates violence and terrorism—this of the man who not only publicly opposed the violence of the second intifada but whose collaboration with Israeli security forces put an end to violence and terrorism in the West Bank. A “circular note” issued to foreign governments by Israel’s Foreign Ministry in October 2011 reaches the “inescapable” conclusion that “no agreement will ever be possible [with the Palestinians] as long as Mahmoud Abbas leads the Palestinian Authority.”

In his speech to the United Nations General Assembly in September, President Obama asserted that Palestinians can achieve statehood only through direct negotiations with Israel,effectively subjecting the Palestinian right to national self-determination to Netanyahu and Avigdor Lieberman’s veto. If Netanyahu and his government choose to present Abbas terms for an agreement that no Palestinian leader could conceivably accept—which, by insisting on Israel’s annexation of all of Arab East Jerusalem is exactly what they have done—they will be able to keep the West Bank and its population under permanent subjugation.

Before demanding that Palestinians return to bilateral talks with Israel, and certainly before punishing Palestinians for refusing to do so, President Obama had an obligation to answer a simple question: What would he have done if Palestinians acceded to his demand and resumed bilateral talks, but continued to encounter Netanyahu’s refusal to negotiate territorial issues from the 1967 border, or to limit changes in that border to territorial swaps? Would he then have allowed the Security Council to address Israel’s rejection without resorting to a veto? His September speech left little doubt about the answer to that question.

So as 2011 ended, the Middle East peace process became history. Despite the U.S.administration’s rhetorical objections to Israel’s settlements and its equally rhetorical support of Palestinian statehood, Obama’s rejection of international intervention and his insistence that a Palestinian state can come about only as the result of a bilateral Israeli-Palestinian agreement sent a clear message to Netanyahu’s government. For all practical purposes, a Palestinian state is no longer on America’s political horizon.

But for this very reason, 2011 was the year in which the international community, including America’s most important European allies, realized the groundlessness of their long-standing belief that the United States is uniquely positioned to leverage its unprecedented support for Israel into pressure to accept a just and balanced peace accord. The international community now sees that the United States is uniquely preventing an agreement, repeatedly using its Security Council vote, or the threat of a veto, to shield Israel from international pressure that might have changed its cost-benefit calculations.

It is this new awareness of an intolerable American bias that provoked four European members of the Security Council to drop the pretense that their governments believe Netanyahu is committed to a two-state solution. Following a closed meeting of the Security Council at which its members received a briefing on Israel’s newly announced construction plans, which would effectively exclude a Palestinian state from any part of East Jerusalem,and therefore rule out a two-state solution, these key European governments described Israel’s continued territorial confiscations as sending “a devastating message” about Israel’s intentions. One senior European official who did not wish to be identified said, “We don’t know where this government is leading Israel to, or what its position is regarding the peace process.” That is diplomatic-speak for “We know where this government is leading Israel and what its position regarding the peace process is, and it can no longer count on our complicity.” India, Brazil and South Africa also condemned Israel’s behavior, as did Russia’s UN envoy.

As long as the peace process was based on the illusion that Israel was always ready to return the Occupied Territories in exchange for Palestinian and Arab recognition, and that America would use its leverage to bring Israel into line if it failed to do so, there was no chance that the peace process could lead to a two-state solution. Now that Netanyahu and Obama have put an end to these two illusions, international sanctions fairly applied to both parties for illegal and predatory behavior are no longer inconceivable. If such intervention were now pursued by an international community no longer willing to accept an American Middle East peace policy that is hostage to its Israel lobby, a Palestinian state living in peace alongside an Israel reconciled to its internationally recognized borders may yet be achievable.

Henry Siegman, president of the U.S./Middle East Project, is a non-resident research professor at the Sir Joseph Hotung Middle East Program, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.

Source:www.bit.ly/yIsuaD

A Prayer for the New Year

2011-12-31T07:48:00.000-08:00

Dear Friend of peace with justice,

Of the scores of articles I've read during the last week, this Xmas homily by the Latin patriarch of Jerusalem is the truest, most noteworthy.

Read it and prophet from its insights, building them into actions in the New Year. At least scan sentences that I have highlighted. Thank you for your readership and semper fi: always remain faithful to the unfinished task. JRK

“A child is born to us, a son is given to us; upon his shoulder dominion rests. They name him Wonderful-Counselor, God-Hero, Father-Forever, Prince of Peace.” Is, 9, 5

"Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace

to those on whom his favor rests.” (Lk 2:14)

President Abu Mazen, Ladies and Gentlemen members of the Government,
H.E. Nasser Judeh, Jordan’s Minister of Foreign Affairs representing King Abdullah of Jordan,
Excellencies, Ambassadors, and Consuls,
Fellow representatives of the various churches,
Dear brothers and sisters, sons and daughters of the Holy Land:

From the Church of the Nativity, close to the Holy Grotto where the Virgin Mary swaddled her son and laid him in a manger, I greet you all, the faithful here present, the viewers, our brothers and sisters of the Diaspora, especially those whom I have met recently. I extend a special greeting to President Mahmoud Abbas and congratulate him in his unfaltering efforts to achieve a just peace in the Middle East, a main thrust of which is the creation of a Palestinian State. I recognize his collaborative efforts with His Majesty, King Abdullah of Jordan who expressed his great concern for Jerusalem, its holy places and especially its inhabitants.

Dear brothers and sisters,

The song of the angels in the sky above Bethlehem more than two thousand years ago still echoes: “Glory to God in the highest and peace on earth” (Lk 2:14). This hymn, with its celestial aura fascinates and instructs us.

Glory to God and peace on earth. The glory of God and the peace of the world are inseparable being bound together by cause and effect. If we glorify God, we shall enjoy his peace. If we glorify ourselves, we shall be denied this peace. Indeed, the glory and adoration of God is a duty and a debt we owe. God promises his peace to those who adore him in spirit and in truth. What reassures us is that God never fails in his promises.
It is true that God does not need us to extol him in order to grow in his majesty, or our praises to perfect his glory. We grow and become better people through our humility before his infinite greatness. The Lord is glorious in himself, his glory coming from his innermost being and from creation, the work of his hands. “The heavens declare the glory of God; the firmament proclaims the works of his hands. Day unto day pours forth speech; night unto night whispers knowledge.” (Ps 19: 2-3).

Our faiths – Muslim, Jew and Christian – are as one in saying that the adoration of God is a fundamental duty of love: “Give to the Lord, you sons of God, give to the Lord glory and might; give to the Lord the glory due his name. Bow down before the Lord’s holy splendor!” (Ps 29:1-2).

We may be proud, for among all the continents and countries of the world, God chose Palestine, our beloved land, to be the homeland of the Saviour, the awaited Messiah, who is his Word and the substance of his glory. And so, we are duty-bound to follow the host of angels in forever repeating: “Glory to God in the highest”. Glory to Him, “for the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men.” (Titus 2:11). Indeed, it appeared a few footsteps away from this holy place where we are gathered this evening.

Of the long awaited Christ, the prophets foretold, “The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him … but he shall judge the poor with justice, and decide fairly for the lands afflicted.” (Is 11:2,4). The good news also concerns enemies: “They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; one nation shall not raise the sword against another, nor shall they train for war again.”(Is 2:4)

Dear faithful, we do not want Christmas to be a subjective and purely emotional sweet memory of an event from a distant past. No, because Christ lives among us, he lives by his resurrection, in his sacraments and in his message: a message of love, of justice and of peace for all peoples, all individuals and all families, a peace that we need more than ever.

Our region is undergoing radical changes that affect our present and our future. We cannot stand by as mere spectators. We, the spiritual leaders and those who hold in their hands the destiny of peoples, must do everything in our power to protect our people, to work for their survival, and to realise their aspirations. We are one with our people, for their suffering and their hopes are our own.

We, who live in the Holy Land, in Palestine, Israel, Jordan and Cyprus hope that the celebration of Christmas may put an end to the culture of violence and death, and that it may inspire a solution to national and international divisions. History teaches us that the will of the people, with their aspirations to peace and freedom, is stronger than the power of injustice. Furthermore, the power of the Almighty is stronger than evil. For this reason, we hope that with the grace of God and with the support of people of goodwill, the physical and psychological walls that men build around themselves may disappear. God wants bridges that unite rather than walls that separate that which God has united. Dear brothers and sisters let us tear down the walls of our hearts in order to tear down walls of concrete!

The Palestinians have recently turned to the United Nations in the hope of finding a just solution to the conflict with the intention of living in peace and in safety with their neighbours. They have been asked to re-engage in a failed peace process. This process has left a bitter taste of broken promises and of mistrust.

Brothers and sisters, at this time of Christmas and by the power of the Prince of Peace, whose incarnation we celebrate, we raise our voices to God, crying out to him in our need. We ask for peace and nothing but peace.

- We ask for peace for the Palestinian people and for the Israeli people.

- We ask for peace, stability and security for the entire Middle East so that our children and their children may live their childhood in innocence, in a healthy environment where they may play together without fear or complex.

- We ask that the road travelled by our ancestors – the Magi and the shepherds – to Bethlehem should remain open, without barriers or hindrance, open to the pilgrims of the whole world, including the Arab world. They will be welcome. Together we shall pray and sing: “Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to men on whom his favour rests”. (Lk 2:14)

- And on this holy night, the children of the Holy Land, fellow citizens of the Infant Jesus, beg us: “Let us grow up as normal children, grant us the time to play in the squares and market places of our towns and villages far from political intrigue.”

However, praying for peace is not enough. Good intentions and fine speeches do not suffice. Let us seek peace with all our strength. Peace is given to men of goodwill. It does not come about without true and courageous builders of peace, ready to sacrifice themselves in so noble a cause. Peace is received and granted at the same time.

Let us listen to the voice of Jesus: “Fear not, I am with you.”(Is 41:10) “Lord, if you are with us, who can be against us?”(Rm 8:31)

Yes, in accordance with your word, Lord, we cast our nets and we recognize that Christmas is a day of celebration.

- According to your word, we invite all to rejoice with us.

- According to your word, we light up the Christmas tree in our churches and in our homes as a sign of hope and of joy. Nothing can take away our hope: neither fear, nor threats, nor the arrogance of men.

O Child of Bethlehem, in this New Year, we place in your hands this troubled Middle East and, above all, our youth full of legitimate aspirations, who are frustrated by the economic and political situation, and in search of a better future. We implore you to grant their wishes and fill their hearts with courage and wisdom together with a spirit of responsibility.

From this church, we express our gratitude and the promise of our prayers to all those who have contributed to peace and justice, to all our friends who have shared our hopes and fears for the Arab revolutions. On this night, we pray for all the world leaders and those who govern us, that they may have wisdom, insight and a spirit of selflessness towards their countrymen. We pray for the return of calm and reconciliation in Syria, in Egypt, in Iraq and in North Africa.

From this church on this holy night, we call on the faithful and the pilgrims to unite with us in prayer for Jerusalem. As its name indicates, it is the city of peace. Its vocation is to bring together believers from all over the world, the sons of Abraham, in one single family. It is the Holy City, the city of prayer. Millions of pilgrims come to pray for peace and reconciliation. We pray that we may receive both and “have them more abundantly.” (Jn 10:10)

From this holy place, I call upon all our brothers and sisters throughout the world. The world is suffering from a lack of charity and human kindness. Our wish for the year is that: “We should love one another as God has loved us and that we may be reconciled with one another as God has reconciled us in Christ”(Ep 4:32) This reconciliation allows us to recognize the image of Christ in others.

May the Peace of the Child of Bethlehem and the song of the angels of heaven “that surpasses all understanding fill your hearts and minds” (Phil 4:7) now and for all the days of your life.

† Fouad Twal
Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem

Former Senator John Sununu Speaks Out

2011-12-16T19:03:00.000-08:00

Dear Friend,

John Sununu adds to our discussion of Newt Gingrich's comments in re the Palestinians and the Israelis.

The former Republican Senator from New Hampshire is a Palestinian Christian. Please read it and prophet. JRK

Gingrich's lie reveals his bigotry
John. E. Sununu
The Boston Globe (Opinion)
December 16, 2011

When bigots speak, their words have purpose. They intentionally choose phrases that inflame, denigrate, and marginalize other races, religions, or nationalities. They employ distortions and stereotypes to bolster false arguments. Which brings us to Newt Gingrich, who in an interview last week derided “an invented Palestinian people.’’ His comments were a calculated — but demonstrably false — slander, designed to curry favor with a constituency for which he cares by insulting one for which he does not.

With one callous statement he dismissed the plight of 4 million people and their desire for self-determination. Questioned about the controversial statement during a debate on Monday, he piled falsehood upon falsehood. The word “Palestinian,’’ he asserted, “did not become a common term until after 1977.’’ In denying the legitimacy of Palestinians’ identity, Gingrich’s only purpose was to deny any justification for a two-state solution for Middle East peace. If Palestinians are invented, the implication goes, so too must be their objection to the status quo.

During the debate, Gingrich claimed to “stand for the truth,’’ but that apparently does not require telling the truth. His statements are a complete fabrication. Documents prepared by the Arab Office in Jerusalem during the 1930s and ’40s refer frequently to “Palestinian Arabs,’’ “Palestinian Citizens,’’ and the potential formation of a “Palestinian State.’’ The 1973 CIA Atlas of Middle East Issues speaks of “Palestinians’’ and “Palestinian Refugees.’’

Contrary to Gingrich’s insinuation, Palestine is a real place found on maps of all kinds, created by people of all races, for hundreds of years; and the people living there have long been identified with it. The Official 1931 Census of Palestine, conducted under British auspices, counted 850,000 Palestinian Arabs - both Muslim and Christian - and 175,000 Jews. Gingrich noted that the Ottomans once ruled the region, as if that justified his statements. But the Ottoman Empire included Syria and much of the Balkans. Are they invented people too?

The egregiousness of Gingrich’s statement isn’t simply in its inaccuracy, but in its objective. It implies that the claims of Palestinians must also be invented — rights to land, to sovereignty, to self-governance. On Monday he asserted, “A right to return is based on a historically false story.’’ Although the right to reclaim or receive compensation for lost property is a question for Israeli-Palestinian negotiation, the historical facts are quite simple. And again, Gingrich has them wrong.

According to the CIA Atlas, the fighting that followed Israel’s declaration of statehood in 1948 displaced 750,000 Palestinian Arabs. Several hundred thousand more were displaced in 1967. Israelis and Palestinians have struggled to find a path to a peaceful resolution since. My point here is not to litigate this struggle, but to recognize that the conflict is real, the people are real, and the grievances are real on both sides: Israel’s unquestionable right to security, and Palestinians’ right to self-rule.

My grandfather was born in Boston, but grew up in Jerusalem as a happy, well-educated Palestinian. As a Christian, he attended the French School and frequented the city’s historic YMCA. He returned to America in the 1930s and settled in New York. In 1948 the fighting forced his parents and cousins to leave their Jerusalem homes. They were never able to return; their houses were on the “wrong’’ side of the armistice line. Their property was taken, though today my cousins’ home looks the same as it did in photos from the 1930s. My great-grandparents lived out their lives in Lebanon. Does Gingrich consider the Lebanese an invented people too?

Gingrich is intelligent, which makes his bigotry all the more dangerous. He employs it not for self-satisfaction, but for political ends. His statements are wrong in fact — and contradict more than 40 years of bipartisan US policy. They reflect a cavalier attitude toward diplomacy, and send the message to allies in Europe and the Middle East that we are inconsistent and unreliable. They were designed to marginalize, not explain; and will be used by extremists on both sides to discourage reconciliation and compromise.

Language can be a wonderful and powerful tool — all the more reason for political leaders to use it thoughtfully and with care. Gingrich’s disgraceful behavior addressing such a difficult and sensitive issue demonstrates that he cannot be trusted to use words carefully. Why should anyone trust him with more?

John E. Sununu, a regular Globe contributor, is a former US senator from New Hampshire. He has not endorsed a presidential candidate. His father, the former New Hampshire governor John H. Sununu, has endorsed Mitt Romney.

--

John

jandskleinheksel@gmail.com

The Myth of "Resuming Negotiations"

2011-12-04T19:21:00.000-08:00

The Myth of “Resuming Negotiations”

By John Kleinheksel Sr, FPI, (Friends of Palestinians and Israelis)

I The Current State of Affairs

The current strategy to get both sides to the negotiating table (in the present cultural environment) won’t work. And here’s why. The Israeli/Jewish state doesn’t believe in negotiations. They are wedded to the belief that all of the land belongs to Jews and must not be shared with the “Other”. Hard as it may be, it is this cultural constant that has to be changed.

The Western press keeps repeating that the HAMAS charter calls for the dismantling of the Zionist/Israeli state. What is not widely known is that the platform/charter of the present Likud administration refuses to consider the establishment of a Palestinian Arab state.

The Likud Party Charter states:
a. The Jordan River will be the permanent eastern border of the State of Israel.
b. Jerusalem is the eternal, united capital of the State of Israel and only of Israel. The government will flatly reject Palestinian proposals to divide Jerusalem.
c. The Government of Israel flatly rejects the establishment of a Palestinian Arab state west of the Jordan River.
d. The Jewish communities in Judea, Samaria and Gaza are the realization of Zionist values. Settlement of the land is a clear expression of the unassailable right of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel and constitutes an important asset in the defense of the vital interests of the State of Israel. The Likud will continue to strengthen and develop these communities and will prevent their uprooting.

Ariel Sharon did “give up” Gaza, but it is so controlled by fences and checkpoints, it’s a virtual prison.

As Stephen Sizer says in his blog: The recent Palestinian UN bid and (the) Palestinian acceptance to UNESCO has once again put the “Peace Process” front and center. Listening to Netanyahu and the U.S. Administration, getting the Israelis and Palestinians “back to the negotiating table” is the utmost priority for a lasting peace deal. Although Netanyahu plays the part, the details of his party platform need to be taken into account as a “peace partner” to show the reality behind the circus. So, while Netanyahu wants no pre-conditions from the Palestinians going into “negotiations” his party charter and ideology say otherwise.
Amos Schocken, the publisher of Haaretz (a progressive voice in Israel), wrote an editorial on November 25, 2011. He makes the case that all recent Israeli leaders are basically following the principles of the Gush Emunim, a religious movement that claims God decrees all of the land for the Jewish state. Here is his shocking expose:

The strategy that follows from the ideology of Gush Emunim is clear and simple: It perceives of the Six-Day War as the continuation of the War of Independence [1948], both in terms of seizure of territory, and in its impact on the Palestinian population. According to this strategy, the occupation boundaries of the Six-Day War are the borders that Israel must set for itself. And with regard to the Palestinians living in that territory - those who did not flee or were not expelled - they must be subjected to a policy that will encourage their flight, eventuate in their expulsion, deprive them of their rights, and bring about a situation in which those who remain will not be even second-class citizens, and their fate will be of interest to no one. They will be like the Palestinian refugees of the War of Independence; that is their desired status. As for those who are not refugees, an attempt should be made to turn them into "absentees" [to better dispossess them]. Unlike the Palestinians who remained in Israel after the War of Independence, the Palestinians in the territories should not receive Israeli citizenship, owing to their large number, but then this, too, should be of interest to no one.
The ideology of Gush Emunim springs from religious, not political motivations. It holds that Israel is for the Jews, and it is not only the Palestinians in the territories who are irrelevant: Israel's Palestinian citizens are also exposed to discrimination with regard to their civil rights and the revocation of their citizenship.

There are competing religious-based fundamentalisms at work in Israel/Palestine. They are seemingly mutually exclusive, i.e., they can’t both be fully implemented. Israel rejects Islamic fundamentalism (whether by Hamas or Iran), yet fails to admit its own religion-inspired fundamentalism.

II Where We Go from Here

So what should American Christians (who have their own brands of fundamentalism) do to work for mutual respect and the rights of all people there?
A good place to start is with the Christians (and Muslims) who have suffered under the occupation for decades and decades. What are they saying? What are they asking? For this we turn to the Kairos Palestine document, composed by Christians in 2009, addressed to themselves, to Muslims, Israelis, Americans and people of other nations.

In a section on “resistance” (4.2), the Kairos document says, we must resist evil of whatever kind. Love is seeing the face of God in every human being. Every person is my brother or my sister. However, seeing the face of God in everyone does not mean accepting evil or aggression on their part. Rather, this love seeks to correct the evil and stop the aggression (4.2.1).

When we review the history of the nations, we see many wars and much resistance to war by war, to violence by violence. The Palestinian people have gone the way of the peoples, particularly in the first stages of its struggle with the Israeli occupation. However, it also engaged in peaceful struggle, especially during the first Intifada. We recognize that all peoples must find a new way in their relations with each other and the resolution of their conflicts. The ways of force must give way to the ways of justice (4.2.2). [Resistance] must find human ways that engage the humanity of the enemy. Seeing the image of God in the face of the enemy means taking up positions in the light of this vision of active resistance to stop the injustices. . . (Kairos Palestine, 4.2.3).

Christians call Muslims to reject fanaticism and extremism (5.4.1). The call to Jews? Even though we have fought one another in the recent past . . . we are able to love and live together. We can organize our political life, with all its complexity, according to the logic of this love and its power (5.4.2).

To the world, Palestinian Christians say: We condemn all forms of racism, whether religious or ethnic, including anti-Semitism and Islamophobia . . . . We call on you to [speak the truth] with regard to Israel’s occupation of Palestinian land. . . .[and we] see boycotts and disinvestment as tools of nonviolence. . . . (6.3).

Even progressive Jews like Rabbi Michael Lerner (Tikkun) argue a new consciousness is needed to avoid the exclusive blaming of one side or the other. In his recent book, Embracing Israel/Palestine, he makes the case that both Jews and Palestinians suffer from a societal form of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. A generation of healers is needed to deal with societal PTSD:

On the one hand, we need a massive campaign of consciousness-raising to challenge the dominant worldview that people care only for themselves and will never be there for each other . . . . On the other hand, we need individual and small group interventions to help people, one by one, overcome the depression and splitting that keep people trapped in self-and-other-destructive patterns of behavior. On this level, the first thing we need to do is created circumstances in which people can feel safe to talk freely about the traumas that they’ve experienced to someone who will help them feel safe and genuinely heard and who will acknowledge their pain (p. 277).
Rabbi Lerner even supports what he calls a “softer version” of the BDS movement (boycotts, disinvestment and sanctions). This softer version supports the right of Israel to exist, yet urges people not to buy from companies that produce consumer goods in the West Bank settlements or produce weapons or other equipment for the Israeli military to use in the West Bank and Gaza (p. 328).

One of the final sections of his book deals with questions and answers. Question: Don’t the Palestinians really want to destroy the State of Israel? Aren’t they just using the camouflage of a ‘peace process’ to build up their military strength until they get the chance to do this? Answer: There are now, and will continue to be . . . a significant minority of people in each community that aspires to see the full elimination of the other side. But maximalist fantasies have typically yielded to new realities in the Middle East. If the majority of Palestinians and Israelis are living in their own secure states with democratic and human-rights-observing governments and with economies providing a decent standard of living for everyone, those troubling aspirations to destroy the Other will become more like the Jewish prayer books’ call for the restoration of animal sacrifices on the grounds of the Jews’ ancient Temple—not yet given up, but nevertheless not likely to be made the cornerstone of any but a small and manageable fringe (p. 379).

III Countering Gush Emunim Ideology in the US Congress and the White House
All Christians of an anti-Fundamentalist bent should join forces to counter the pernicious influence of religious fundamentalism whether in Palestine, Israel or America. When we listen further to Amos Schocken, we understand how deeply the Gush Emunim ideology has wormed its way into American politics, the “religious right” and the US House and Senate. This is especially true in the Republican Party but is also true of the Democrats and our President. Here is the continuation of Mr. Schocken’s op-ed:

Since the Six-Day War, there has been no other group in Israel with the ideological resilience of Gush Emunim, and it is not surprising that many politicians have viewed that ideology as a means for realizing personal political ambitions . . . .(among them, Ariel Sharon and Benjamin Netanyahu).
This ideology views the creation of an Israeli apartheid regime as a necessary tool for its realization . . . .

This ideology has enjoyed immense success in the United States, of all places. President George H.W. Bush was able to block financial guarantees to Israel because of the settlements established by the government of Yitzhak Shamir . . . .Now, though, candidates for the Republican Party's presidential nomination are competing among themselves over which of them supports Israel and the occupation more forcefully. Any of them who adopt the approach of the first President Bush will likely put an end to their candidacy.
Whatever the reason for this state of affairs - the large number of evangelicals affiliated with the Republican party, the problematic nature of the West's relations with Islam, or the power of the Jewish lobby, which is totally addicted to the Gush Emunim ideology - the result is clear: It is not easy, and may be impossible, for an American president to adopt an activist policy against Israeli apartheid.

Friends, we have work to do. Work to change the culture and environment. We will be vulnerable to “the “other”. We will engage “enemies”, and be open to self-criticism and the view-points of other participants. Healing and peace will not come until we admit hurts we have caused and that we have experienced.
We will blunt the influence of the Jewish and American “religious right” that almost totally permeates the current culture and discourse in both Israel and America right now. Here are resources, people and groups seeking genuine change:

Read the novel, Mornings in Jenin, Susan Abulhawa, does for Palestinians what The Kite Runner did for Afghanistan

Read the book, Kairos for Palestine, Rifat Odeh Kassis (Badayl/Alternatives Press), www.kairospalestine.ps

Check regularly with Mark Braverman, American Jewish activist who supports land rights and peaceful co-existence between Israelis and Palestinians, www.markbraverman.org

Read, Embracing Israel/Palestine: a Strategy to Heal and Transform the Middle East, Rabbi Michael Lerner, (North Atlantic Books, Berkeley, CA) www.tikkun.org

Peace Now (The American chapter of Peace Now) www.peacenow.org.il

Jewish Voices for Peace (JVP) www.jewishvoiceforpeace.org

Churches for Middle East Peace (CMEP) www.cmep.org

Holy Land Trust (Sami Awad in Bethlehem) www.holylandtrust.org

Gush Shalom (Uri Avnery and Adam Keller) www.gushshalom.org

The Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD), Jeff Halper, www.ichahd.org

The Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), www.isna.net/interfaith

Challenging Christian Zionism, www.christianzionism.org

The Israeli/Palestinian Mission Network, www.israelpalestinianmissionnetwork.org

Fatah/HAMAS reconcilation efforts must suceed

2011-11-28T16:18:00.000-08:00

Dear Friend,

It is really very important that Hamas be brought into the fold of the PLO. The following article (Karl Vick in TIME magazine), suggests that Hamas may be moderating its position of vowing violent opposition to the Israeli state. Israel will continue to argue that Hamas has not and will not change, but wants to "destroy" Israel.

As long as the Palestinians are divided between two factions, no significant "negotiations" can take place. Hamas (Gaza authority) must be party to any agreement, or it will not be worth the paper it's printed on.

Israel boosted Hamas by finally agreeing to terms for the release of Gilad Shalit, the captive Israeli soldier.

Read on. By the way, EMBRACING ISRAEL/PALESTINE, the new book by Rabbi Michael Lerner, is a must read. From his base in psychology, and his ministry in Jerusalem for many years, Mr. Lerner shows a correspondence between PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) and the Israeli (Holocaust) psyche, and that internal healing and transformation must take place for any true dealing with "the other" to happen. More on this book later. JRK

Hamas Edges Closer to the Mainstream: Agreeing
to Noviolence, Opening the Door to Recognizing Israel

Monday, November 28, 2011

By Karl Vick

The leaders of the two biggest Palestinian parties met in Cairo on Thanksgiving, and just going by the

headlines afterward, you'd have thought nothing had happened. "Palestinians talk unity, no sign of progress,"

said Reuters. AP: "Palestinian rivals talk, but fail to resolve rifts." But read the stories, and it becomes clear

that a great deal is going on, with immense implications for the future of peace talks with Israel.

Israel's government dismissed the meeting with a wave of the terrorist card. Hamas is regarded by the West

and Israel as first and foremost a terrorist organization, and so Mark Regev, who speaks for prime minister

Benjamin Netanyahu, framed the reconciliation as something that can only contaminate the pacifist

credentials of Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas, the Fatah party chief widely known as Abu

Mazen:"The closer Abu Mazen gets to Hamas," Regev said, "the farther he moves away from peace."

But what if Abbas is holding still, and Hamas is moving closer to Abbas? That's what's been happening, from

nearly all appearances, for the last two or three years, and everything coming out of the Cairo meeting points

in the same direction. The head of Hamas, Khaled Meshaal, and Abbas spoke for two hours, Abbas in the big

chair, Meshaal on the couch with two others. Afterwards both met the cameras smiling. "There are no

differences between us now," Abbas said. Mashaal went with: "We have opened a new page of partnership."

And on whose terms? Hamas stands for resistance, its formal name being the Islamic Resistance Movement.

But in the Gaza Strip where it governs, Hamas has largely enforced a truce with Israel since January 2009.

And in Cairo it signed a paper committing itself to "popular resistance" against the Israeli occupation of

Palestinian territories. That's "popular" in contrast to "violent" or "military" resistance. We're talking marches

here. Chanting and signs, not booby traps or suicide bombs.

"Every people has the right to fight against occupation in every way, with weapons or otherwise. But at the

moment, we want to cooperate with the popular resistance," Meshaal told AFP. "We believe in armed

resistance but popular resistance is a program which is common to all the factions."

What's going on here? For one thing, Abbas appears to have coaxed his party's militant rival into his fold.

""This is my assessment," says Omar Shaban, the Gaza economist and civil society leader who runs

Pal-Think, a think tank. "Abu Mazen has succeeded in bringing them one step closer to his program. I think

the election will be the real test for the whole process."

And how. Hamas and Fatah, factions that four years ago were engaged in civil war as Hamas's militia drove

Fatah's militia out of Gaza, now live in fear not of each other, but of the Palestinian people. The Arab Spring

has transformed the political dynamic -- something Meshaal said out loud to AFP. Both Fatah and Hamas

know they are disappointments to the people. The least they can do is stop fighting each other, the foremost

demand of the public, and the reason both leaders emerged from their closed meeting saying, in so many

words, "Look! Look! We really are reconciling! Just as we promised!" If Hamas needed any extra incentive,

it's available in the excruciating collapse of Syria, where Meshaal keeps his office. If Fatah needed any extra

incentive, it's available in the UN Security Council report on the application for Palestinian statehood, which

noted that the applicant, Abbas' Palestinian Authority, does not even control the Gaza Strip, surely a

minimum requirement of sovereignty.

Actual reunification of the West Bank and Gaza will come with the unity government of technocrats the two

factions promised in May, when their reconciliation was formally declared. That placeholder government still

has yet to be announced -- placeholder, that is, pending spring 2012 elections that produce a new legislature

and president -- but at last there's evidence of progress. The point of conflict had been who would serve as

prime minister. Fatah insisted on Salam Fayyad, a favorite of the West and a technocrat's technocrat who

has held the job on the West Bank for four years. Hamas wanted Fayyad out. A couple of week ago, after

months of stalemate, he agreed to go. But neither side is rushing him because he remains the West's trusted

conduit for hundreds of millions in foreign aid. That aid covers the salaries of government workers both in the

West Bank and Gaza -- where Fatah continues to pay 70,000 employees even though Hamas controls the

government. The PA has by far the biggest payroll in the Palestinian territories, a donor economy if ever there

was one. And however they may differ on Fayyad, both Fatah and Hamas want to see people get paid,

because, again, who do they fear most?

Quite possibly biggest news out of Cairo was deep in the fine print: Efforts are under way to bring Hamas into

the PLO, or Palestine Liberation Organization, the umbrella for all Palestinian factions. The PLO is the one

"brand" that still resonates with ordinary Palestinians, and Hamas has wanted to join it since at least 2005. If

Hamas finally gets in, the implications would appear to be immense. It would mean agreeing to the positions

and agreements the PLO has already made. This includes recognizing Israel, and renouncing terror -- two

things Hamas has never been willing to do. "Yes, when they are in they have to agree to the political program

of the PLO," says Shaban. "This will take time." But should it occur, it would complete Hamas' move toward

the center, and open the door to the international recognition craved by many in the organization.

The biggest question out of Cairo was what the PLO will look like in a few months. An effort to "reform" the

body was announced along with the move to bring Hamas on board. The first meeting was set for Dec. 22.

Reform is something Palestinian analysts call overdue, citing the elderly -- some say "sclerotic" --

composition of the PLO's executive committee. But it makes for yet one more piece to watch on a chess

board where the pieces are moving as quickly as events. The meeting, after all, was in Cairo.

Click here for more Reports and Commentary

To view this article online, please go to:

http://globalspin.blogs.time.com/2011/11/27/hamas-edges-closer-to-the-mainstream-agreeing-to-nonviolence

-opening-the-door-to-recognizing-israel/?xid=gonewsedit

http://www.thejerusalemfund.org/ht/display/ContentDetails/i/32133/pid/895/displaytype/raw

Speak out for Equality

2011-11-19T06:42:00.000-08:00

Dear friend,

There is a battle raging. Narratives competing: 1) for exclusion of the other 1) for inclusion and fairness for all.

Rovit Avni sees what happens in E. Jerusalem as a microcosm of how the Isr/Pal relationship is being worked out.

Read on and prophet. It will be decided. It is being decided. We can be participants, not spectators. Speak out. Cast the vision of an inclusive Jerusalem. There will be those who want it for themselves. It is to be a model of how Jews, Christians, Muslims and others can live together in peace and respect. Honor/lift up those who are working for this outcome. JRK

Who Will Write Jerusalem's Story?

Ronit Avni
The Huffington Post (Opinion)
November 18, 2011 - 12:00am
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ronit-avni/who-will-write-jerusalems_b_1100536.htm...

While Jerusalem has always received its fair share of attention at the center of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, too often it is treated as an idealized symbol rather than a real place. In debates surrounding the future of the city, religious proclamations and lines on maps overshadow the needs and interests of the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians and Israelis who live, work and raise their families in the city.

This is the real struggle taking place today in Jerusalem: a battle between those whose vision for the city hinges on guaranteeing full rights and a dignified existence for all residents, and those who place politics and divine decree ahead of the everyday needs of the people. It is a contest for the character of the city and, in recent months, almost unnoticeably amidst the steady barrage of news from the region, it has entered a particularly dangerous phase.

Two weeks ago, the Jerusalem office of Peace Now, an Israeli NGO that has played a leading role in tracking illegal Israeli settlement growth, received a bomb threat that led to its evacuation. Several days later, the home of Hagit Ofran, the head of that organization's settlement monitoring team, was vandalized and covered with graffiti for the second time in weeks. Messages scrawled in Hebrew on her building bore several death threats, including one that ominously declared, "Ofran, [assassinated Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak] Rabin is waiting for you."

Hagit is one of many Israeli and Palestinian activists and grassroots leaders working nonviolently toward a resolution to the conflict and an end to the occupation. Though they are often marginalized in public discourse, these individuals embody some of the best hopes we have for a brighter future in Jerusalem and the region as a whole: they are committed to a nonviolent approach, seek a future that promises security, freedom and dignity for both Israelis and Palestinians, and are willing to make huge personal sacrifices to fight for the integrity of the societies they live in. In an environment rife with political gamesmanship and cynical maneuvering, they stubbornly insist on putting human needs first.

But, instead of having their contributions recognized, these visionaries are consistently subject to demonization and attack, and their personal safety is now at serious risk. Ms. Ofran's case is unfortunately not the only recent display of violent intolerance Jerusalem has witnessed lately: Just over a month ago, a group of Palestinian farmers and Israeli activists protesting peacefully against the seizure of the farmers' land by settlers were attacked and badly beaten by angry mobs from the Jerusalem settlement-suburb of Anatot. The violence took place as Israeli police stood by, and in a particularly sinister turn, at least one of the attackers turned out to be an off-duty police officer.

This violence is taking place at a time when prospects for a shared future in the city are dimming. As the Israeli government continues to announce one new construction project after another in East Jerusalem, scores of Palestinians residents also face the prospect of eviction by Israeli settlers. It is becoming painfully clear that the prevalent attitude of those controlling Jerusalem is not about preserving and equitably developing a fragile city that is precious to all, but about aggressively claiming it as a prize to be won.

All of this means that the efforts of those striving to create a tenable future for both Israelis and Palestinians in the city are more important now than ever. For those of us not directly involved in this work, there are two clear responsibilities: First, we must ensure that attacks against them are denounced across the board, and that the perpetrators are caught and brought to justice. Second, and perhaps more importantly, now is the time to increase our awareness and support for people like Hagit and the work that they do, and to encourage those around us to do the same.

Though the trends in Jerusalem are worrisome, they are by no means irreversible. It is within our power as a global audience to ensure that Jerusalem's story is written not by extremists and obstructionists, but by those who are working pragmatically on the ground toward a sustainable, shared future. Our attention will not only provide these individuals with some small measure of protection, it will also go a long way toward ensuring that their vision of Jerusalem, as a holy city in which the rights and dignity of all are respected, becomes a reality.

This responsibility is what recently drove us at Just Vision to create a new short film series, Home Front: Portraits from Sheikh Jarrah, which tells the story of an ongoing nonviolent campaign in one East Jerusalem neighborhood. The movement was started by Palestinian residents in response to the displacement of several Palestinian families from their homes by Israeli settlers. It quickly drew in scores of Israeli supporters who were horrified to see what was being done in their name. While it has faced challenges, the campaign in Sheikh Jarrah has drawn crucial attention to the cynical game being played in East Jerusalem, and to the unbearable human cost of letting ideology and political interests eviscerate people's lives and livelihoods. But more attention is needed to reverse this trend.

Many of us have had moments where we've looked back at inspiring social movements, such as the Civil Rights or feminist movements, and have wished we could have been there in the early days to lend our hand to unknown activists taking their first bold steps toward a new reality. Despite the seeming hopelessness of the situation, we are now at such a moment in Jerusalem. While it is up to the residents of the city to guide it in a direction they see fit, it falls to us to support and encourage those whose approach we believe in, and to do all we can to raise their voices above the din. It is a remarkable opportunity. May we not squander it.

A Call to Action!

2011-11-10T09:20:00.000-08:00

Dear Friend,

Too often, I send you information, with no call for action. This is a call for action. Take a few minutes to understand this appeal.

Click on the links. Register your opposition to this proposed action by the Israeli Miliary to destroy this village's energy source.

Faithfully yours, and with thanks to Pauline Coffman of the PCUSA IPMN (Israel/Palestine Mission Network). JRK

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: EAPPI Advocacy Officer
Date: Thu, Nov 10, 2011 at 7:27 AM
Subject: URGENT ACTION APPEAL: Israeli Military to Demolish Clean Energy Supply Serving 390 PalestiniansTo: EAPPI Advocacy Officer

SUMMARY OF EVENTS:

The Israeli military plans to demolish a set of solar panels in Imneizil, a village in the south Hebron hills, cutting off the power to forty families, a health clinic and a school. The solar plant is the village’s only source of electricity, and is subject to a military order effective from today (Thursday, 10 November 2011).

Imneizil is off the electricity, water and sewage networks due to military restrictions on Palestinian development in Area C (62 percent of the West Bank). Two years ago, a Spanish NGO installed solar panels on land belonging to the village, replacing expensive gasoline generators. The Israeli military refused to grant a building permit for the panels.

A few weeks ago, villagers found a demolition order near a fence around the panels. Israeli organization Rabbis for Human Rights launched a legal campaign against the demolition, arguing that the panels did not require a building permit in the first place, and that electricity is a basic humanitarian need. Yet, after 39 appeals, the order remains and hope is fading that the half-million dollar project can be saved.

The prospect of being cut off again horrifies Mohammad Yousef, Imneizil School’s headmaster.

“Without electricity, the educational process comes to a standstill,” he says. “For instance there is the computer.The printer. And then maybe you have a documentary film to show the students. You become unable to provide educational materials.”

Additional Information:

The solar panels were installed by SEBA, a Spanish NGO, in coordination with Al-Najah University in Nablus. The total cost was €365,500 of which the Spanish Cooperation supplied €290,000. For more information on the project, please contact Carlos Sordo at carlos.sordo@seba.es.

INTERNATIONAL HUMANITARIAN LAW:

Article 23 of the Hague Convention of 1907 clearly states that, “it is especially forbidden (for the occupier) to destroy or seize the enemy's property, unless such destruction or seizure be imperatively demanded by the necessities of war."

Article 53 of the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949 states, “Any destruction by the Occupying Power of real or personal property belonging individually or collectively to private persons, or to the State, or to other public authorities, or to social or cooperative organizations, is prohibited, except where such destruction is rendered absolutely necessary by military operations.”

MAKE A DIFFERNCE:

We encourage you to:

·Forward this email to your networks

·Inform your representative in parliament about what is happening in Imneizil

·Contact the following officials and call on them to allow Palestinians in Area C to have free access to electricity, water and sewage infrastructure without the threat of demolitions:

oYour Ambassador and/or Consul General in Israel

oThe Israeli Ambassador in your country

oIsraeli Minister of Defense:

§Ehud Barak

§Ministry of Defence

§Fax: +972 3 691 6940/696 2757

§Email: minister@mod.gov.il

§Salutation: Dear Minister

oIsraeli Military Judge Advocate General:

§Major General Avihai Mandelblit

§Fax: +972 3 569 4526/608 0366

§Email: avimn@idf.gov.il

§Salutation: Dear Judge Advocate General

oIsraeli Military Chief of Staff

§Lieutenant-General Benny Gantz

§Fax: +972 3 691 6940/ 697 6218
§ Salutation: Dear Lieutenant-General

Nader Hanna
Advocacy Officer
Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine & Israel (EAPPI)
P.O. Box 741
Jerusalem 91000
Tel: +972 2 628 9402
Fax: +972 2 627 4499
Mobile: +972 54 815 7652
E-mail: eappi.advocacy@alqudsnet.com
Website: www.eappi.org

--

John

www.friendsofpalestiniansandisraelis.blogspot.com

Roger Cohen weighs in, Again

2011-11-08T05:00:00.000-08:00

November 7, 2011

The Last Jew in Zagare

By ROGER COHEN

ZAGARE, LITHUANIA — The last Jew in Zagare, a small Lithuanian town renowned for its cherries, died in September. His name was Aizikas Mendelsonai, born in 1922. He was not buried in either of the two Jewish cemeteries, with their lurching gravestones, faded inscriptions and advancing lichen. Nobody is any more, not even Jews.

At his birth, Mendelsonai was one of almost 2,000 Jews living in Zagare, with its seven synagogues, its Hebrew school and its Jewish People’s bank. Jews made up about 40 percent of the town’s population. Then, in swift succession, came Soviet annexation, blamed by many on “Jewish Bolsheviks,” and Nazi occupation, bent on annihilation of the Jews.

The Nazis wasted little time after pushing into Lithuania in June, 1941. The Jews of Zagare were herded into a ghetto. Almost 1,000 Jews from nearby towns, including Siauliai, were forced to join them. On Oct. 2, 1941, they were ordered into the main square before being taken into the woods for execution by Nazi SS killers and their Lithuanian accomplices.

SS Standartenführer Karl Jäger stated in a report that day that 2,236 Jews were killed in Zagare. In 1944, the Soviets, having fought their way back, examined a mass grave and found 2,402 corpses (530 men, 1,223 women, 625 children, 24 babies). Today, a visitor to Zagare — there are not many — is greeted by a sign pointing to woods of birch and pine: “Graves of the Victims of the Jewish Genocide.”

I recount these events for two reasons. The first is that my grandmother Pauline (“Polly”) Soloveychik was from Zagare, and my grandfather Morris Cohen was from Siauliai, and so I have a natural interest in what would have befallen them had they remained. Their hypothetical European fate was to die nameless in a nameless ditch.

Even at the end of her long life, lilacs could bring Polly to tears because they recalled Zagare; even then she spoke Russian to her parrot. Memory thrust her back in the woods where she had wandered.

The second reason is that I have been pondering the Zagare-Zionism link. The resilience of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict — its capacity to last through the Cold War, the post-Cold War, the digital revolution, the rise of China, the Arab Spring — is due in part to the near-perfect equivalency of moral claim to the same land.

What emerged from the Holocaust — from the agony of every little Zagare — was the success of Zionism. Benny Morris, the Israeli historian, has written, “As the pogroms in Russia in the 1880’s had launched modern Zionism, so the largest pogrom of them all propelled the movement, almost instantly, into statehood.”

Through its vote of Nov. 29, 1947, calling for the establishment of two states in the Holy Land — one Jewish and one Palestinian Arab — the United Nations sought to expiate Nazi crimes by granting the Jews what Morris calls “an international warrant for a small piece of earth.”

The thing is, that piece of earth, birthplace of the Jewish people, was not empty. In fact, at the time of the U.N. vote, about 630,000 Jews faced about 1.3 million Palestinian Arabs in the Holy Land. Palestinians failed to see why they should pay for the Holocaust. Arab states, invoking Saladin’s triumph over the Crusaders, seeing in Israel a new expression of European colonialism, went to war against the U.N.’s will — and lost.

Einstein, arguing for Israel, wrote that, “In the august scale of justice, which weighs need against need, there is no doubt as to whose is more heavy.” The Arab League put the opposite case: “There can be no greater injustice and aggression than solving the problem of the Jews of Europe by another injustice” — against the Palestinian Arabs.

Solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict begins with accepting that there is no just outcome, none. Enough Jews and Arabs have died trying to prove the rightness of their cause. Imperfect compromise is the only way out of the spiral.

Carrying Zagare in my blood, aware of what centuries of Jewish precariousness have wrought, I believe the case for Israel was and remains overwhelming, but an Israel that condemns another people to permanent exile is not the one its founders imagined.

An Israeli state, a Palestinian state, economic union between them, international oversight of the holy places in Jerusalem and Bethlehem: The U.N. idea of 1947 is not a million miles from what any lasting peace must involve.

The second stage of solving the conflict is realizing there are no new ideas, none. The only option is gathering the will to reach the known trade-off.

I went to see the grave of Mendelsonai — the last Jew in Zagare. So, I thought, Zagare is finally Judenrein. In a sense the Nazis have won.

Then, nearby, I saw a European Union flag and thought, no.

Mendelsonai, in his 89 years, lived through five Lithuanias — independent, Soviet, Nazi, Soviet and independent. The last was best, a small state, secure, in NATO, tied in economic union with its neighbors, at peace even with Russia.

It’s amazing what putting the future above the past, jobs above some unattainable justice, can forge.

You can follow Roger Cohen on Twitter at twitter.com/nytimescohen.

Prophetic and True Assessment by IPMN

2011-11-03T11:06:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,

The Israeli/Palestinian Mission Network (IPMN) of the Presbyterian Church (USA) has issued a statement I hope you will read (and send along to persons in your world).

It accurately summarizes the current situation, unmasks true Israeli intention to colonize the whole of Isr/Pal, and perpetuate the Occupation of the Palestinian people.

The US continues to take its cue from the Israeli right wing government instead of assessing its own strategic interests in the ME and standing up to Israel. The situation is more dire than our media lets on. The tail continues to wag the dog. Lamentable. But understandable in light of diminishing influence by the US over affairs there (or anywhere else). World leadership is transitioning away from the Americans.

(Disclosure: I attended the IPMN annual conference this fall in Louisville, KY). JRK
Contact:
Noushin Framke, Communication Chair: info@theIPMN.org

Israel to Palestine: "You are Damned if You Do, and Damned if You Don't"

NEW YORK — Nov. 3, 2011 — The Israel Palestine Mission Network of the Presbyterian Church (USA)* (IPMN) condemns the announcement by the Israeli government to accelerate expansion of settlement construction and financially sanction the Palestinian Authority as a response to the successful bid by its leadership to join UNESCO this week. The IPMN calls upon President Obama to take a clear, public stand against this decision because it threatens any hope that peace negotiations can occur between Israeli and Palestinian leaders in the foreseeable future.

By this action, Israel's intentions have become quite clear: It will expand settlements when the Palestinians are at the negotiating table; and, it will expand settlements when they are not at the table. With this move, Israel is taking away the legitimate choice all peoples have of seeking relief within the appropriate international structures dedicated towards global community and peace building. In addition, in light of reports by Israel's own generals that the Palestinian Authority has played a major role in reducing extremist violence, it is absurd to cut off funds to an official Palestinian entity that is helping to achieve nonviolence inside the pressure cooker of Israeli apartheid.

Historically, in regard to settlement building, the facts cannot be disputed: Israel has been expanding them at break neck speed under the leadership of every one of its prime ministers since the Six-Day War in June 1967. The pace has even accelerated following the breakdown of the Oslo Accords in 1993. Israeli historian, Gershom Gorenberg has pointed out why settlement expansion, and not peace negotiations, is the top priority for Israeli leadership: "What we're seeing is a classic example where a diplomatic initiative has the effect of accelerating settlement construction. When there is a fear or suspicion that a diplomatic process might actually take place...there is a tendency among settlement supporters within the government to try to speed things up."

Complicating matters is the recent announcement by the United States State Department to withhold $60M from UNESCO, as dictated by U.S. law (1990 & 1994) requiring the withdrawal of financial support from any U.N. entity that admits Palestine into its membership. Senator Tim Wirth (D-CO) described what is at stake as a result of this decision: "The United States is on the brink of abandoning its decades-long leadership in several international organizations-a process that will fundamentally undermine American national security and economic interests ... UNESCO leads global efforts to bring clean water to the poor, promotes educational and curriculum building in the developing world, and manages a tsunami early warning system in the Pacific, among other important tasks."

The Palestinians will be applying for membership in all 16 U.N. agencies in the coming months. These include the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). If these U.N. agencies vote to admit Palestine as UNESCO did so overwhelmingly, will the United States continue to withdraw its support in a time when its leadership in such areas is so greatly needed? Will the United States actually find itself in the position of sabotaging efforts towards global stability and well-being because of its indefensible, parochial view that Palestine can only seek terms of a just peace through the methods or channels the U.S. has approved? Will the U.S. stand against Palestinian membership in U.N. agencies just to satisfy Israel even at the cost of U.S. interests elsewhere in the world?

The Israel Palestine Mission Network regrets that an effort by Palestinian leadership to work within the structures of the greatest international peacekeeping and peacemaking body in the world can lead to even more isolation of Israel and the U.S. and further undermine peace, security and justice not only in the Middle East but globally. The network calls upon all Christian, as well as interfaith bodies to contact our national leadership at every level to make our financial and military aid to Israel contingent upon an immediate halt to the building and expansion of illegal settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

*Established by action of the 2004 General Assembly, the IPMN seeks to demonstrate solidarity, educate about the facts on the ground, and change the conditions that erode the humanity of both Israelis and Palestinians, especially those who are living under occupation in East Jerusalem, the West Bank, and Gaza. The network speaks TO the Church not FOR the Church.

--

John

jandskleinheksel@gmail.com

Huge Influx of (Christian) Immigrants to Israel

2011-10-30T17:59:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,

Here is a fascinating article on the mostly HIDDEN influx of non-Israeli (Christian) guest workers changing the demographics of our region.

Most informative, and what does it mean further down the road? Filipina, African, Indian. and other (mostly Roman Catholic) Christians now outnumber Arab Christians five to one.

With thanks to the American Task Force on Palestine (AFTP) for bringing it to our attention. JRK

In the Holy Land, a changed Christian world

Matti Friedman
The Statesman (Analysis)
October 27, 2011 - 12:00am
http://www.statesman.com/news/nation/in-the-holy-land-a-changed-christian-world-...

The schedules for Mass at the two Roman Catholic churches in Jaffa, on Israel's Mediterranean coast, reveal a change that has dramatically, if quietly, altered the face of Christianity in the Holy Land.

The two Masses in Arabic for the town's native Arab Christian population are outnumbered by four in English, attended mainly by Filipina caregivers. Then there are others in Spanish, for South Americans; French, for African migrants; three South Asian languages, including Konkani, spoken in the Indian district of Goa; and, for a generation of Christians raised among Israel's Jewish majority, Hebrew.

In September, a colorful celebration for Indian Catholics alone drew 2,000 people. That's twice the total number of native Catholics in the parish.

For centuries, Christianity here meant the ancient communities of Christian Arabs. They were here when Israel was created around them in 1948, and they have kept their distinct identity within the Jewish state since. The past two decades, however, have seen one of the most significant influxes of Christians into the Holy Land since the Crusades, and it has created a wholly new Christian landscape shaped by the realities of Israel.

The newcomers include guest workers from dozens of different countries who provide the economy with cheap labor, and asylum-seekers from Sudan, Eritrea and elsewhere in Africa who sneak across the border from Egypt. And for the first time, there is a significant population of non-Arab Christian Israeli citizens, mainly immigrants from the former Soviet Union who, unlike Arabs, are fully assimilated into the Jewish Israeli mainstream.

Their presence has created new challenges for local churches that are simultaneously, like churches across the Mideast, facing the uncertain future of their local flocks. The numbers of Israel's 110,000 native Arab Christians have largely stagnated: They're not shrinking, but neither are they growing, as many young people leave for the West, squeezed by the conflict between Jews and Muslims and party to the general sense of neglect shared by Israel's Arab citizens.

Father Ramzi Sidawi, an Arab Catholic from Jerusalem, is the parish priest in Jaffa. Outside the church windows, he said, he now listens every day to children from Africa and the Philippines playing in Hebrew, the language of their schools and their parents' employers.

"You have to divide yourself, switch between languages. We have to serve everybody," he said. "The biggest challenge is to maintain the community united and not divided."

That's a difficult task, considering the gulf of language and culture that divides the newcomers from each other and from Arab Christians. There don't seem to be overt frictions or resentments, but in practice, Sidawi said, there is little contact among them beyond shared Masses on Christmas and other festivals. The non-Arabs who attend church in Jaffa, for example, live elsewhere, mainly in foreign worker-dominated districts of nearby south Tel Aviv.

If one counts all of the people in Israel who are neither Jewish nor Muslim, these newcomers outnumber Arab Christians by more than five to one. The number of newcomers who are practicing believers is far smaller, but by some estimates they equal or outnumber the members of local churches.

"This creates concern for some that in the long term there could be a change in who the Christians of the Holy Land are, and concern about what will happen to the historic churches," said Amnon Ramon, who has researched these demographic changes as an expert on Christianity in Israel at the Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies.

There are enough newcomers now for a Catholic cathedral in every major Israeli city, said Rev. David Neuhaus, who heads the Church's vicariate for Hebrew-speakers.

"We do not have enough clergy, and we do not have enough places to pray," he said. So services are held in ad hoc locations or in the existing Arab churches.

Clergymen now find themselves dealing with problems like Sudanese asylum-seekers trying to prove paternity without papers, choir members deported by Israeli immigration police, and children who go to Jewish public schools and are drawn not by their parents' Christianity but by the culture of their Israeli peers.

On a recent Sunday, the chapel at the Ratisbonne monastery in downtown Jerusalem rang with the sound of hymns in Tagalog, one of the languages of the Philippines. Most of the worshippers were women who serve as caregivers for elderly Israelis.

There were 5,000 Filipino workers in Israel when Father Angelo Beda Ison, a Manila-born Franciscan who tends to the local Filipino community, arrived in 1991. Today there are 40,000.

For the first time, the Catholic Church has to deal with Catholic kids who are assimilating into a Jewish majority. There are now several thousand children born to foreign workers who speak Hebrew as a first language, celebrate Jewish holidays with their classmates and are subject, like children everywhere, to the pull of the mainstream.

To bolster their faith, the local church has produced a catechism in Hebrew — "Meet the Messiah" — provides classes on Christianity in Hebrew and invites them to a Catholic summer camp, Rev. Neuhaus said. The church now has 25 clergymen tending to the transient populations, some brought in from the workers' countries of origin, he said.

Catholics are not the only Church dealing with demographic shifts.

Immigrants from the former Soviet Union began moving to Israel en masse in the early 1990s. Among the 1 million who came, about a third were not Jewish according to Jewish law but qualified for citizenship because they had a Jewish spouse or lineage. Among them were an estimated 50,000 to 80,000 practicing Christians, mostly Orthodox.

So the Russian Orthodox Church now holds services in Hebrew every week in Jerusalem.

"The Church never dreamed of such an arrival," said Father Alexandr Winogradsky, the priest who leads those services and a convert from Judaism originally from Ukraine. His job is to "try to acculturate the Church within the new Israeli culture and language."

Some of the new members, especially the young, are so assimilated into the Israeli mainstream they are uncomfortable entering a church, he said. Winogradsky goes to meet them, dressed in cassock and cross, for confession in cafes instead.

The tiny Ethiopian Orthodox Church, too, has been dealing with its own newcomers: asylum seekers from Eritrea reaching Israel in increasing numbers, smuggled in from Egypt by Bedouin. At a baptism ceremony on the Jordan River earlier this year, Eritreans were the most noticeable group.

These disparate groups of Christians share one trait — they have gone almost unnoticed by the majority of Israelis.

"This is a population that is present and absent at the same time," said Hana Bendcowsky of the Jerusalem Center for Jewish-Christian Relations. "No one here knows anything about their lives."

Christian Leaders Support Palestinian UN Statehood Bid

2011-10-26T10:26:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,

Christian leaders say yes to Palestine U.N. membership. Read in full.

With the deal for prisoner exchange with HAMAS, Israel has suceeded in perpetuating and strenghtening the division and rivalry between Palestinian factions, which is always to the advantage of the Israelis, who can argue no one voice really speaks for the Palestinians. Efforts now to prop up Pres. Abbas (FATAH) will also fortify the division. The youth of Palestine keep arguing for new elections and unity of voice among all Palestinians, a movement much to be desired. JRK

International law, basic fairness at stake, say four denominational leaders

October 25, 2011

Presbyterian News Service

Louisville

Leaders of four denominations have issued a statement backing the Palestinian Authority’s bid for membership in the United Nations.

U.N. membership for the Palestinians is deserved, the four leaders say, “not only on the basis of international law and basic fairness … but to preserve a multi-religious holy land that includes Christian Palestinians.

The full text of the statement, given to Presbyterian News Service on Oct. 24:

The Palestinians deserve membership in the United Nations — not only on the basis of international law and basic fairness — but to help preserve a multi-religious holy land that includes Christian Palestinians. We write as elected leaders of Protestant denominations with mission histories in the Middle East, a deep commitment to our sisters and brothers in Christ in the region, and a concern for the security of Israelis and Palestinians. We serve a God who calls us to seek justice. We look forward to the day when, by God’s grace, swords are beaten into plowshares. We stand united in prayer for peace and reconciliation among Jews, Christians, and Muslims. We write aware that an Obama Administration veto of Palestinian membership in the United Nations would put further pressure on Palestinian Christians and Christian minorities elsewhere in the Middle East.

We understand the view expressed by United States and Israeli representatives that international recognition by the UN is no substitute for two-party, two-state negotiations. But the reverse is also true, given the prolonged and undeniable failure of the negotiations between parties of vastly different power. Membership for Palestine does not preclude either the need for or the possibility of negotiations. Outstanding issues including an end to the occupation, final borders, the status of Jerusalem, settlements, and the right of return would remain to be resolved through negotiation. We believe that UN membership for Palestine would increase the likelihood of fair and transparent negotiations on these issues, as those negotiations would then take place between two members of the United Nations.

Moves in Congress to cut development aid to the Palestinian Authority to punish it for seeking UN membership seem unwise and counter-productive. Funds to strengthen security, education, and healthcare programs for ordinary Palestinians should not become pawns in the politics of a UN confrontation. In fact, cuts in aid from the U.S., the largest single-state donor to the Palestinians, would erode the quality-of-life improvements that have been achieved in the West Bank. Moreover, these cuts would be detrimental to the security of Israelis and Palestinians alike, not to mention U.S. interests in the region.

We are committed to the right of both Israelis and Palestinians to live in peace and security with their neighbors, within internationally recognized borders as described by UN resolutions that envision two viable states. We believe UN membership for Palestine would be a step in that direction.

No church leader wants controversy, yet we share a Bible that includes the critical and self-critical voices of the prophets. We invite those who disagree with us to visit Palestine and Israel, to go through the walls surrounding Bethlehem and Gaza, to understand the economic chokehold of the occupation.

We urge the Obama Administration not to use the veto for a 42nd time when the Security Council considers the recommendation for membership for Palestine, but to abstain—for the sake of a better future for the entire holy land.

Geoffrey A. Black
General Minister and President
United Church of Christ

Gradye Parsons
Stated Clerk of the General Assembly
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

Sharon E. Watkins
General Minister and President
Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)

Jim Winkler
General Secretary
United Methodist General Board of Church & Society

http://www.pcusa.org/news/2011/10/25/christian-leaders-say-yes-palestine-un-membership/

On Understanding Experimental Israel

2011-10-18T18:34:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,

Welcome to this FPI group: "Friends of Palestinians and Israelis" (link below for archive).

Since meeting wonderful new friends at the Israel/Palestine Mission Network (of the Pres. Church USA) last week, several have asked to "join".

I'm enclosing an important piece from long time Israeli dissident Uri Avnery, who reflects on the meaning of the "Israeli experiment".

Significant quote: "You can take the Jews out of the ghetto, but you can't take the ghetto out of the Jews".

Read on. Thanks to the ATFP (The American Task Force on Palestine, whose researcher, Hussein Ibish, was a guest on the Jim Lehrer program this evening).

Will there be a "shock"? A tipping point? A critical mass leading to "change"?

Having concluded a deal with HAMAS, is it possible to do even more deal making? Through Eygpt? Turkey? Russia? France? (the US is bankrupt as neutral broker. We are not neutral. Nor are we willing to use the clout we are capable of expending because of the political cost. JRK

Israel needs a shock: Positive or negative
Uri Avnery
Arab News (Opinion)
October 16, 2011 - 12:00am
http://arabnews.com/opinion/columns/article519177.ece

On Yom Kippur eve last week, when real Jews were praying for their lives, I sat on the seashore of Tel Aviv, thinking about the State of Israel. Will it endure? Will it be here in another 100 years? Or is it a passing episode, a historic fluke?

The Zionist Revolution — and that's what it was — started more than a hundred years after the French one. Once, in a more cheerful mood, I told my friends: “Perhaps we are all wrong. Perhaps Israel is not really the final shape of the Zionist enterprise. Like the planners of every great project, the Zionists decided first to build a 'pilot', a prototype, in order to test their scheme. Actually, we Israelis are only guinea pigs. Sooner or later another Theodor Herzl will come by and, after analyzing the faults and mistakes of this experiment, will draw up the blueprint of the real state, which will be far superior.”

Herzl 2 will start by asking: where did Herzl 1 go wrong? Herzl 1 visited Palestine only once, and that only for the express purpose of meeting the German emperor, whom he wanted to enlist for his enterprise. The Kaiser insisted on seeing him at the gate of Jerusalem, listened patiently to what he had to say and then purportedly commented to his aides: “It's a grand idea, but you can't do it with Jews!”

He meant the Jews he knew — the members of a worldwide religious-ethnic community. Herzl intended to turn these into a modern-style nation.

Herzl was not a profound thinker, he was a journalist and dramatist. He — and his successors — saw the necessary transformation as basically a question of logistics. Get the Jews to Palestine, and everything will fall into place automatically. The Jews will become a normal people, a people (“Volk”) like other peoples. A nation among nations. But the Jews of his day were neither a people nor a nation. They were something rather different.

Europe has changed many times, until the emergence of the modern nations. The Jews did not change. When Herzl looked for a solution to the “Jewish problem”, they were still the same ethnic-religious Diaspora.

No problem, he thought, once I get them to Palestine, they will change. But an ethnic-religious community, living for millennia as a persecuted minority in a hostile environment, acquires a mentality of its own. It fears the “Goyish” government, the source of unending evil edicts. It sees everyone outside the community as a potential enemy. It develops an intense sense of solidarity with members of its own community, even a thousand miles away, supporting them through thick and thin, whatever they do. In their helpless situation, the persecuted dream of a day of revenge, when they can do unto others as others have done unto them.

All this pervades their worldview, their religion and their traditions, transmitted from generation to generation. Jews have prayed to God for centuries, year after year, on Pesach eve: “Pour your wrath upon the Goyim...”

When the Zionists started to arrive and founded the new community, called the “Yishuv” (settlement), it seemed that Herzl had been right. They started to behave like the embryo of a real nation. They discarded religion and despised the Diaspora. To be called “exile Jew” was the worst possible insult. They saw themselves as “Hebrew”, rather then Jewish. They started to build a new society and a new culture.

And then the awful thing happened: The Holocaust.

It brought all the old Jewish convictions back with a vengeance. Not only the Germans were the guilty, but all the nations who looked on and did not lift a finger to save the victims. So all the old beliefs were true after all: The whole world is against the Jews. Right from its founding, the State of Israel became the Holocaust-state. The old existential fears, mistrusts, suspicions, hatreds, prejudices, stereotypes, sense of victimhood, dreams of revenge, that were born in the Diaspora, have superimposed themselves on the state, creating a very dangerous mixture of power and victimhood, brutality and masochism, militarism and the conviction that the whole world is against us. A ghetto with nuclear weapons.

Can such a state survive and flourish in the modern world? European nation-states have fought many wars. But they never forgot that after a war comes peace, that today's enemy may well be tomorrow's ally. Israel cannot do that. Public opinion polls show that the vast majority of Israelis believe that there will never be peace. They see the eternal occupation of Palestinian territories and the setting up of belligerent settlements all over Palestine as a result of Arab intransigence, not as its cause. They are supported in blind solidarity by most of the Jews around the world.

Almost all Israeli parties, including the main opposition, insist that Israel be recognized as the “nation-state of the Jewish people.” This means that Israel does not belong to the Israelis (the very concept of an “Israeli nation” is officially rejected by our government) but to the worldwide ethnic-religious Jewish Diaspora, who have never been asked whether they agree to Israel representing them. It is the very negation of a real nation-state that can live in peace with its neighbors and join a regional union.

I have never labored under any illusions about the magnitude of the task my friends and I set ourselves decades ago. It is not to change this or that aspect of Israel, but to change the fundamental nature of the state Itself.

It is far more than a matter of politics, to substitute one party for another. It is even far more than making peace with the Palestinian people, ending the occupation, evacuating the settlements. It is to effect a basic change of the national consciousness, the consciousness of every Israeli man and woman.

It has been said that “you can get the Jews out of the ghetto, but you can't get the ghetto out of the Jews.” But that is exactly what needs to be done.

Can it be done? I think so. I certainly hope so.

Perhaps we need a shock — either a positive or a negative one. The appearance in Jerusalem of Anwar Sadat in 1977 can serve as an example of a positive shock: By coming to Jerusalem while a state of war was still in effect, he produced an overnight change in the consciousness of Israelis. So did the Rabin-Arafat handshake on the White House lawn in 1993. So did, in a negative way, the Yom Kippur war, exactly 38 years ago, which shook Israel to the core. But these were minor, brief shocks compared to what is needed. A Second Herzl could, perhaps, effect such a miracle, against the odds. In the words of the first Herzl: “If you want it, it is not a fairy tale.”

American Jews Beg to Differ!

2011-10-11T18:43:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,

Rev. Duncan Hanson, the RCA staff person for Europe, the Middle East and India, has asked that I officially represent the RCA at the I/PMN annual conference beginning tomorrow thorugh Saturday noon in Louisville, KY. [This is the Israeli/Palestinian Mission Network of the Presbyterian Church (USA)].

He wonders if there will be a request from the PCUSA denomination (there) asking for action/involvement by the RCA in this important region. We'll see.

Meanwhile there is a Task Force busy writing a "paper" to be presented to the General Synod of the RCA in 2012, concerning the Israeli/Palestinian situation. I look forward to reading it. Several of my "friends" are on the Task Force, (including three Palestinian Christians). It should be good.

Below, you will appreciate Jay Michaelson's overview of various approaches American Jews now have toward Israel/Palestine. Such a public expression would not have seen the light of publishing day or even been possible a few years ago. Times they are a-changin'. Faithfully yours, JRK

What's Wrong With American Jews Taking Partisan Sides in [re] Israel?

Jay Michaelson
The Jewish Daily Forward
October 11, 2011 - 12:00am
http://forward.com/articles/143901/

That there has been a realignment of American Jewish attitudes toward Israel is by now apparent and heavily commented on. In some quarters, this has been seen as an earth-shattering, Judaism-betraying paroxysm of collective self-hatred. Yet in fact it is entirely logical.

For years, Jewish moderates like me have held a curious combination of views: as one of my law school colleagues said, “liberal on everything except Israel.” This was because for years there was little alternative. There was no peace process, no nonviolent Palestinian leadership and nothing (other than the far left’s dreams of peace) for moderates to support.

The 18 years since the handshake on the White House lawn have yielded a much wider policy array. Now one can be for or against Palestinian statehood, concessions on Jerusalem, construction of settlements, the blockade of Gaza, the withdrawal from Gaza and 100 other gradations of Israel-Palestine policy. As a result, American and American Jewish attitudes have shifted — but shifted quite predictably.

Conservatives both here and in Israel maintain that the Palestinians fundamentally cannot be trusted; like most conservatives, they prefer “tough” tactics like settlement construction (“facts on the ground”), “stronger” security policies and “harder” lines in negotiation, since to be “soft” would endanger Israel’s security. Like other conservatives, they tend to be more nationalistic, and therefore less sympathetic to the “other side.” These policies flow quite naturally from a generally conservative worldview and are not dissimilar to conservatism in other countries around the world.

Liberals, while also skeptical of the Palestinian leadership, prefer typically liberal policies: more “balancing” in security policies (that is, fewer walls and checkpoints); “confidence-building” steps, such as a freeze on settlements, and “hard choices” in negotiations (that is, concessions on key issues). Unlike conservatives, liberals tend to be leery of nationalism and somewhat sympathetic to how the “other side” sees things. These policies, too, flow from basic liberal premises about peace and conflict, pragmatism, even human nature.

In other words, the American Jewish realignment is simply an alignment of conservatives with conservative policies and of liberals with liberal ones.

American conservatives (Rick Perry, Glenn Beck, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee) support Israeli conservatives (Likud, Yisrael Beiteinu, the settlers). American moderates (J Street, the Obama administration) support Israeli moderates (Kadima, what remains of Labor). The American far left (Noam Chomsky, most college-student activists) supports the Israeli far left (Shalom Achshav, as well as various non-Zionist and anti-Zionist movements). So of course, The New York Times can report, as it did just prior to the Palestinian vote at the United Nations, on the love affair between Benjamin Netanyahu and congressional Republicans. What’s not to understand here?

Well, for a start, many on the right don’t see their own conservatism. I recently spoke with a Knesset member who couldn’t understand why settlement construction was a conservative policy. Personally, I couldn’t understand what she couldn’t understand. It may or may not be a good idea to put facts on the ground, but doing so is clearly a conservative policy. It doesn’t promote an atmosphere of trust. It empowers Jewish nationalists. It makes a negotiated peace much harder to achieve. But, if conservatives are right that there is no real Palestinian partner, the policy makes sense. We’re already locked in battle, so we may as well try to win.

That view is respectable, time-honored — and conservative. So of course Glenn Beck supports it, and moderates and liberals do not.

As in the United States, where the right has often painted the left as being anti-American, some in the Jewish community say that to be moderate or liberal is to be anti-Israel. Nowhere was this more obvious than in the defeat, in a special congressional election, of Orthodox Jewish moderate David Weprin by Bob Turner, which pundits have in part ascribed to Turner’s attack on Weprin’s and President Obama’s policies toward Israel. Exit polls say that the economy, and the Democrats’ having taken Anthony Weiner’s former seat for granted, was as important as Israel or as suddenly relevant ex-mayor Ed Koch’s call to send Obama a message. But at least for some voters, there was indeed a perception that Obama’s moderate rather than conservative approach to Israel was the same as being anti-Israel.

Other American Jewish conservatives say that liberals are somehow deluded, or unaware of the real existential threats facing Israel. Sometimes they whisper that we are self-hating, or Muslim loving (Barack Hussein Obama), or insufficiently Jewishly proud. But can they say the same of the many Israeli generals who have increasingly come forward in favor of a negotiated two-state solution and against settlement construction? Are they, too, naïve, deluded, secretly anti-Israel, secretly Muslim loving, self-hating or worse? Of course not. Israeli moderates, American moderates, Israeli liberals and American liberals support Israel, but they have a moderate or liberal view of what policies are in Israel’s best interests. We thus oppose the current Israeli government’s policies, while fully supporting Israel itself.

Again, why is this hard to follow?

Just as conservatives are confused about their own conservatism, so, too, are they confused (willfully or not) about the boundaries of liberalism. Of course, there are also hard-left, anti-Israel and anti-Zionist folks out there, and “in here” — that is, within the Jewish community. Often, we liberals and moderates find ourselves at the same rallies (or Sabbath dinner tables) as these people, and it’s uncomfortable for us all. But breaking bread together doesn’t turn moderates into radicals. Just as a supporter of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee is not a Kahanist, so a J Street supporter is not a Hamasnik, or even a Shalom Achshavnik. The fringe does not define the movement.

Actually, the reason I think this realignment seems so hard for many people to understand is because of the peculiar dynamics of American Jewish institutions. These institutions are inherently to the right of most American Jews. People who, facing a wide range of philanthropic options, choose to devote considerable resources to Judaism and to Israel fund them. That is laudable. But it also selects for those philanthropists who tend toward more nationalistic and particularistic points of view. Nonparticularistic Jews give more to non-Jewish causes. Jewish particularists fund Jewish causes.

This, too, makes sense. But it leads to the disconnect that I, as well as Peter Beinart and others, have lately decried: that American Jewish institutions don’t speak for most American Jews. Yes, in congressional districts like New York’s 9th, blocs of Orthodox Jews will vote for conservative policies, foreign and domestic. But in general, American Jews are more liberal than their communal institutions, because the institutions are funded and populated by people who have chosen to make Judaism their professional or philanthropic priority.

Of course, there are fantastic progressive Jewish funders and organizations, as well — including this very publication — and I salute them all. But we remain in the minority. Most progressives have less interest in Jewish particularism, and are more likely to be found at The New Yorker and Amnesty International than at specifically Jewish institutions. This doesn’t make them self-hating; it makes them less interested in Jewish particularism. And because of this “liberal drain,” what’s left in our Jewish communal institutions tends naturally toward the right.

Personally, I think conservative policies are bad for both America and Israel. I think they are self-fulfilling: Treat others as enemies, and they will be your enemies. This has now come to pass in Israel, as its ostensible partner has given up on the peace process (which has been neither peaceful nor a process) and gone to the United Nations instead. As Larry Derfner astutely observed in the September 30 issue of the Forward, the Palestinians did so because Netanyahu’s negotiating/delaying tactics left them no other viable option. They have thus fulfilled conservatives’ prophecies that there is no partner on the other side — but only because the conservatives left them no choice.

These are my views, but I don’t pretend that they are somehow “the truth,” or part of some great new understanding of the Middle East. They are garden-variety American liberalism, based on fundamental premises about universalism, rationalism and conflict resolution. Nor do I think that conservatives have somehow missed the point of the Jewish prophetic tradition. Conservatives have their texts, and we liberals have ours. I think they are wrong on both facts and values. But there shouldn’t be any mystery here as to why we all think this way. The only mystery is why there’s a mystery at all.

Nicholas Kristof (NY Times) op-ed. Oct. 5, 2011

2011-10-06T04:34:00.000-07:00

October 5, 2011

Is Israel Its Own Worst Enemy?
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF (NY Times, Oct. 5, 2011)

For decades, Palestinian leaders sometimes seemed to be their own people’s worst enemies.

Palestinian radicals antagonized the West, and, when militant leaders turned to hijackings and rockets, they undermined the Palestinian cause around the world. They empowered Israeli settlers and hard-liners, while eviscerating Israeli doves.

These days, the world has been turned upside down. Now it is Israel that is endangered most by its leaders and maximalist stance. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is isolating his country, and, to be blunt, his hard line on settlements seems like a national suicide policy.

Nothing is more corrosive than Israel’s growth of settlements because they erode hope of a peace agreement in the future. Mr. Netanyahu’s latest misstep came after the Obama administration humiliated itself by making a full-court diplomatic press to block Palestinian statehood at the United Nations. At a time when President Obama had a few other things on his plate — averting a global economic meltdown, for example — the United States frittered good will by threatening to veto the Palestinian statehood that everybody claims to favor.

With that diplomatic fight at the United Nations under way, Israel last week announced plans for 1,100 new housing units in a part of Jerusalem outside its pre-1967 borders. Instead of showing appreciation to President Obama, Mr. Netanyahu thumbed him in the eye.

O.K., I foresee a torrent of angry responses. I realize that many insist that Jerusalem must all belong to Israel in any peace deal anyway, so new settlements there don’t count. But, if that’s your position, then you can kiss any peace deal goodbye. Every negotiator knows the framework of a peace agreement — 1967 borders with land swaps, Jerusalem as the capital of both Israeli and Palestinian states, only a token right of return — and insistence on a completely Israeli Jerusalem simply means no peace agreement ever.

Former President Bill Clinton said squarely in September that Mr. Netanyahu is to blame for the failure of the Middle East peace process. A background factor, Mr. Clinton noted correctly, is the demographic and political change within Israeli society, which has made the country more conservative when it comes to border and land issues.

Granted, Mr. Netanyahu is far from the only obstacle to peace. The Palestinians are divided, with Hamas controlling Gaza. And Hamas not only represses its own people but also managed to devastate the peace movement in Israel. That’s the saddest thing about the Middle East: hard-liners like Hamas empower hard-liners like Mr. Netanyahu.

We’re facing a dangerous period in the Middle East. Most Palestinians seem to feel as though the Oslo peace process has fizzled, and Israelis seem to agree, with two-thirds saying in a recent poll published in the newspaper Yediot Aharonot that there is no chance of peace with Palestinians — ever.

The Palestinians’ best hope would be a major grass-roots movement of nonviolent peaceful resistance aimed at illegal West Bank settlements, led by women and inspired by the work of Mahatma Gandhi and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. A growing number of Palestinians are taking up variants of that model, although they sometimes ruin it by defining nonviolence to include stone-throwing and by giving the leading role to hotheaded young men.

The Israel Defense Forces can deal with suicide bombers and rockets fired by Hezbollah. I’m not sure that they can defeat Palestinian women blocking roads to illegal settlements and willing to endure tear gas and clubbing — with videos promptly posted on YouTube.

Mr. Netanyahu has also undermined Israeli security by burning bridges with Israel’s most important friend in the region, Turkey. Now there is also the risk of clashes in the Mediterranean between Israeli and Turkish naval vessels. That’s one reason Defense Secretary Leon Panetta scolded the Israeli government a few days ago for isolating itself diplomatically.

So where do we go from here? If a peace deal is not forthcoming soon, and if Israel continues its occupation, then Israel should give the vote in Israeli elections to all Palestinians in the areas it controls. If Jews in the West Bank can vote, then Palestinians there should be able to as well.

That’s what democracy means: people have the right to vote on the government that controls their lives. Some of my Israeli friends will think I’m unfair and harsh, applying double standards by focusing on Israeli shortcomings while paying less attention to those of other countries in the region. Fair enough: I plead guilty. I apply higher standards to a close American ally like Israel that is a huge recipient of American aid.

Friends don’t let friends drive drunk — or drive a diplomatic course that leaves their nation veering away from any hope of peace. Today, Israel’s leaders sometimes seem to be that country’s worst enemies, and it’s an act of friendship to point that out.

Jews in Conflict over "Israel"

2011-09-29T13:39:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,
Dana Goldstein, a NYC Jew, in conflict with her parents' generation over the State of Israel.
It's like an earthquake is going on. And where the earth settles is still not clear. But it sounds like everyone will have to adjust to the new landscape, as difficult as that will be.
Palestinian existence on the "land" persists, despite long efforts to ignor, displace and resist their grievances.
Stay tuned, and be in touch with Dana and her generation. More is undoubtedly coming. "God" loves all people. As one of my friends put it this morning at our fortnightly gathering: "If God is not God of all, God is not God at all". (Thank you Gene!). JRK

Thursday, Sep. 29, 2011
Why Fewer Young American Jews Share Their Parents' View of Israel
By Dana Goldstein

"I'm trembling," my mother says, when I tell her I'm working on an article about how younger and older American Jews are reacting differently to the Palestinians' bid for statehood at the United Nations. I understand the frustrations of the Palestinians dealing with ongoing settlements construction and sympathize with their decision to approach the U.N., but my mom supports President Obama's promise to wield the U.S. veto, sharing his view that a two-state solution can be achieved only through negotiations with Israel.

"This is so emotional," she says as we cautiously discuss our difference of opinion. "It makes me feel absolutely terrible when you stridently voice criticisms of Israel." (See photos inside the West Bank settlements.)

A lump of guilt and sadness rises in my throat. I've written harshly of Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 2006 and its assault on Gaza in 2009, and on civil rights issues in Israel. But speaking my mind on these topics — a very Jewish thing to do — has never been easy. During my childhood in the New York suburbs, support for Israel was as fundamental a family tradition as voting Democratic or lighting the Shabbos candles on Friday night.

My mom has a masters degree in Jewish history and is the program director of a large synagogue. Her youthful Israel experiences, volunteering on a kibbutz and meeting descendants of my great-grandmother's siblings, were part of my own mythology. Raised within the Conservative movement, I learned at Hebrew school that Israel was the "land of milk and honey" where Holocaust survivors had irrigated the deserts and made flowers bloom.

What I didn't hear much about was the lives of Palestinians. It was only after I went to college, met Muslim friends, and enrolled in a Middle Eastern history and politics course that I was challenged to reconcile my liberal, humanist worldview with the fact that the Jewish state of which I was so proud was occupying the land of 4.4 million stateless Palestinians, many of them refugees displaced by Israel's creation. (See TIME's photoessay on growing up Arab in Israel.)

Like many young American Jews, during my senior year of college I took the free trip to Israel offered by the Taglit-Birthright program. The bliss I felt floating in the Dead Sea, sampling succulent fruits grown by Jewish farmers, and roaming the medieval city of Safed, historic center of Kabbalah mysticism, was tempered by other experiences: Watching the construction of the imposing "security fence," which not only tamped down on terrorist attacks, but also separated Palestinian villagers from their lands and water supplies. I spent hours in hushed conversation with a young Israeli soldier who was horrified by what he said was the routinely rough and contemptuous treatment of Palestinian civilians at Israeli military checkpoints.

That trip deepened my conviction that as an American Jew, I could no longer in good conscience offer Israel unquestioning support. I'm not alone. Polling of young American Jews shows that with the exception of the Orthodox, many of us feel less attached to Israel than do our Baby Boomer parents, who came of age during the era of the 1967 and 1973 wars, when Israel was less of an aggressor and more a victim. A 2007 poll by Steven Cohen of Hebrew Union College and Ari Kelman of UC Davis found that although the majority of American Jews of all ages continue to identify as "Pro-Israel," those under 35 are less likely to identify as "Zionist." Over 40 percent of American Jews under 35 believe that "Israel occupies land belonging to someone else," and over 30 percent report sometimes feeling "ashamed" of Israel's actions.

Read about America's first female black rabbi.

Hanna King, an 18-year old sophomore at Swarthmore College, epitomizes the generational shift. Raised in Seattle as a Conservative Jew, last November King was part of a group of activists who heckled Netanyahu with slogans against the occupation at a New Orleans meeting of the Jewish Federations General Assembly.

"Netanyahu repeatedly claims himself as a representative of all Jews," King says. "The protest was an outlet for me to make a clear statement, and make it clear that those injustices don't occur in my name. It served as a vehicle for reclaiming my own Judaism." (Read more about the debate on a Palestinian state.)

A more moderate critique is expressed by J Street, the political action committee launched in 2008 as a "pro-Israel, pro-Peace" counterweight to the influence in Washington of the more hawkish American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). Simone Zimmerman heads J-Street's campus affiliate at the University of California-Berkeley. A graduate of Jewish private schools, she lived in Tel Aviv as an exchange student during high school, but never heard the word occupation spoken in relation to Israel until she got to college.

During Zimmerman's freshman year, Berkeley became embroiled in a contentious debate over whether the university should divest from corporations that do business with the Israeli army. Although Zimmerman opposed divestment, she was profoundly affected by the stories she heard from Palestinian-American activists on campus.

"They were sharing their families' experiences of life under occupation and life during the war in Gaza," she remembers. "So much of what they were talking about related to things that I had always been taught to defend, like human rights and social justice, and the value of each individual's life." (Read the top 10 religion stories of 2010.)

Even young rabbis are, as a cohort, more likely to be critical of Israel than are older rabbis. Last week, Cohen, the Hebrew Union College researcher, released a survey of rabbinical students at New York's Jewish Theological Seminary, the premier institution for training Conservative rabbis. Though current students are just as likely as their elders to have studied and lived in Israel and to believe Israel is "very important" to their Judaism, about 70 percent of the young, prospective rabbis report feeling "disturbed" by Israel's treatment of Arab Israelis and Palestinians, compared to only about half of those ordained between 1980 and 1994.

Ben Resnick, 27, is one of the rabbinical students who took the survey. In July, he published an op-ed pointing out the ideological inconsistencies between Zionism, which upholds the principle of Israel as a Jewish state, and American liberal democracy, which emphasizes individual rights regardless of race, ethnicity, or religion. "The tragedy," Resnick says, is that the two worldviews may be "irreconcilable."

Still, after living in Jerusalem for 10 months and then returning to New York, Resnick continues to consider himself a Zionist. He quotes the Torah in support of his view that American Jews should press Israel to end settlement expansion and help facilitate a Palestinian state: "Love without rebuke," he says, "is not love."

Dana Goldstein is a fellow at the New America Foundation and the Nation Institute.

A New Start for Rosh Hashanah!

2011-09-28T08:14:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,

I admire Bradley Burston. (Below is his op-ed in Haaretz) Especially in the honesty that opens up the crack in our facade of self-righteousness. It is in all and each of us. Some dare not go there. Self-assessment is hard. I would rather be invincible and correct, all the time, rather than "give in" to others, especially those whose intent is to do me irrevocable harm.

I have long felt that the average Israeli is scared to death of giving the Palestinian narrative even "one inch", lest the whole occupation edifice come crashing down.

So there is this constant buildup of walls, and military and entrenchment in "our way", our country, our narrative.

To look at the other narrative, openly, non-defensively, and walk in the "other's shoes". O my. That takes courage. There may have to be changes. And that would be God-aweful. Yes, in awe of "God", the King over all nations, tribes and peoples. Yours truly, JRK

Palestine, the UN, and lies at Rosh Hashanah

This year, in Jerusalem, show us what a New Year actually looks like. Avinu Malkeinu, hoshiyeinu. Rescue us from ourselves.

On the High Holidays when I was small, Jews wore clothes they were not comfortable in, in order to ask themselves questions they were not comfortable with.

Some things don't change.

On the High Holidays when I was small, the old people, when they weren't discussing the Old Country, would talk about the Holy Land, and peace, and how they would never see either, not in their lifetimes.

The rabbi, meanwhile, would talk about God's Book of Life, in which we all appeared, each of us with what we had done over the past year, and done wrong, and failed to do. On Rosh Hashanah, God would open the book for review, and at the end of the day of judgment, Yom Kippur, our verdict for the new year would be handed down, and the book, until the next fall, slammed shut.

Mindful of the Book of Life, I used to wonder what became of what we had left undone. This year, the Friday before Rosh Hashanah, I found out. Thanks to the United Nations.Thanks to the debate on Palestine:

Anything left undone becomes a lie.

Who'd have guessed that what's true in daily life is also true of the UN? Who'd have guessed that what was left undone when I was small, would still be undone these many, many years later?

When I was small and could take no more of the High Holidays, and when there was no baseball on the radio, I would open a book. One of them began with an observation by Pablo Picasso. "Art," he said, "is a lie which makes us realize the truth."

The same, I now realize, could be said of the United Nations. And because it is left undone, it can be said of Palestine as well. And because Palestine has been left undone, the same could be said of Israel. Left undone. Like all of us.

We pray to the same God - all of us, we and the Palestinians who are our cousins and neighbors, we pray to the lord of the second chance - but our belief is flagging. We are undone and unmoving. We cannot shake our grief and our failure and our guilt and our instinct for blame. We are undone by politics and by bad politicians. We are undone by warped religion and bad clerics. We are undone by our belief that only from our side do people see clearly and speak the whole truth.

When I was small, my favorite part of the High Holidays was singing with the old people to the prayer called Avinu Malkeinu, in part because there seemed some unique truth in it. "For Your own sake, Lord, if not for ours," the old people sang, "forgive us, let us off this hook, rescue us from ourselves."

Avinu Malkeinu, Our Father, Our King, they sang, these people whose own parents were long dead, these people who had never placed faith in the nobles who had once ruled over them, these people whose own voices were already fading. Avinu Malkeinu, Shma Koleinu, Hus V'Rahem Aleinu. Hear our voice. Help us hear the voices of others whose stories and tragedies are different. Help them to hear ours.

Hear our true voice, the one from close to the heart inside. Avinu Malkeinu, have pity for what we do and are and try and fail at, and what we give ourselves too much credit for. Give us permission to start again. Give us, this day, a break.

Avinu Malkeinu, haneinu v'aneinu, ki ein lanu ma'asim. Avinu Malkeinu. Cut us a deal we can live with. Avinu Malkeinu, help us find, at long last, an answer we can use, a way out of this, even though we have nothing to show for all our trying. Because we have nothing to show for all our trying..

God who does not make mistakes, God whom we bitterly and consistently disappoint, God whose land always falls short of the arrangement we feel would somehow dress the wounds in our souls - dress the wounds in our souls.God who created human differences and human disagreement and human compromise, help us write a new document for every one of us. A Book of Life.

Show us Your face in the faces of the people we find it easier to look away from and call enemy. Show them Your face in ours. For the same reason. Show us what we least want to see: That we look the same.

Avinu Malkeinu, Aseh Imanu Tz'dakah V'Hesed, V'Hoshieinu We talk big, but we are, all of us, small and fallible and wounded. Be kind. Teach us finally to grow tired of our own lies. Teach us to finish what we start. This year, in Jerusalem, show us what a New Year actually looks like. Avinu Malkeinu, hoshiyeinu. Rescue us from ourselves.

The Quarttete on The Next Steps

2011-09-24T08:42:00.000-07:00

Friend,

The US, Russia, the EU and the UN are scrambling to find ways of getting Israelis and Palestinians to sit down and hash things out in the light of the conflicting narratives set forth at the General Assembly (UNGA) on Friday.

Here is their statement for the record. Don't put too much faith into it. It's a theological and ethical matter and politicians don't do very well with love for God and others.

JRK

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Following is the text of a statement issued after the meeting of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, and EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy of the European Union Catherine Ashton in New York on September 23, 2011.

The Quartet takes note of the application submitted by President Abbas on 23rd September 2011 which is now before the Security Council.

The Quartet reaffirmed its statement of 20th May 2011, including its strong support for the vision of Israeli-Palestinian peace outlined by United States President Barack Obama.

The Quartet recalled its previous statements, and affirmed its determination to actively and vigorously seek a comprehensive resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict, on the basis of UN Security Council Resolutions 242, 338, 1397, 1515, 1850, the Madrid principles including land for peace, the Roadmap, and the agreements previously reached between the parties.

The Quartet reiterated its commitment to a just, lasting and comprehensive peace in the Middle East and to seek a comprehensive resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict, and reaffirms the importance of the Arab Peace Initiative.

The Quartet reiterated its urgent appeal to the parties to overcome the current obstacles and resume direct bilateral Israeli-Palestinian negotiations without delay or preconditions. But it accepts that meeting, in itself, will not reestablish the trust necessary for such a negotiation to succeed. It therefore proposes the following steps:

1. Within a month there will be a preparatory meeting between the parties to agree an agenda and method of proceeding in the negotiation.

2. At that meeting there will be a commitment by both sides that the objective of any negotiation is to reach an agreement within a timeframe agreed to by the parties but not longer than the end of 2012. The Quartet expects the parties to come forward with comprehensive proposals within three months on territory and security, and to have made substantial progress within six months. To that end, the Quartet will convene an international conference in Moscow, in consultation with the parties, at the appropriate time.

3. There will be a Donors Conference at which the international community will give full and sustained support to the Palestinian Authority state-building actions developed by Prime Minister Fayyad under the leadership of President Abbas.

4. The Quartet recognizes the achievements of the Palestinian Authority in preparing institutions for statehood as evidenced in reports to the Ad Hoc Liaison Committee, and stresses the need to preserve and build on them. In this regard, the members of the Quartet will consult to identify additional steps they can actively support towards Palestinian statehood individually and together, to secure in accordance with existing procedures significantly greater independence and sovereignty for the Palestinian Authority over its affairs.

5. The Quartet calls upon the parties to refrain from provocative actions if negotiations are to be effective. The Quartet reiterated the obligations of both parties under the Roadmap.

6. The Quartet committed to remain actively involved and to encourage and review progress. The Quartet agreed to meet regularly and to task the envoys and the Quartet Representative to intensify their cooperation, including by meeting prior to the parties’ preparatory meeting, and to formulate recommendations for Quartet action.

PRN: 2011/1585

John

jandskleinheksel@gmail.com

www.friendsofpalestiniansandisraelis.blogspot.com

A Message for Christian Zionists

2011-09-22T12:05:00.000-07:00

An Open Letter to America’s Christian Zionists

From David P. Gushee and Glen H. Stassen
September 19, 2011

Dear Christian Brothers and Sisters,

Greetings in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. We write to you about an urgent matter of common concern.

In a week or so, unless their plans change dramatically, Palestinian leaders will make a unilateral declaration of a State of Palestine based on the pre-1967 borders and will turn to the United Nations for a vote to recognize their new state.

The present Netanyahu government of Israel is, of course, totally opposed to this course of action on the part of the Palestinians. The United States government (predictably) shares this opposition. Both nations tell the Palestinians that the proper path to a state is through negotiations leading to an agreement that can settle all outstanding territorial and political issues. Palestinian leaders respond that they continue to support negotiations but that they can no longer pin all of their hopes on them.

This is because progress on that elusive peace agreement has been nonexistent for years. Of course, both sides blame each other for that lack of progress. But meanwhile, on a visit to the Occupied Territories this summer along with 50 students from Fuller Seminary who were studying just peacemaking (see http://justpeacemaking.blogspot.com/p/just-peacemaking.html), we were shown repeatedly how Israeli settlements (actually, planned cities and towns on occupied Palestinian land) are eating away at the territory that would belong to any viable Palestinian state. The Palestinians are convinced that the Netanyahu government in Israel is pursuing a strategy of delaying negotiations while creating facts on the ground that will make a Palestinian state impossible. A visitor to the increasingly encircled and truncated Palestinian territories can see these facts on the ground with his own eyes if he is willing to look. The Palestinian leadership believes that they had better declare statehood now before the territory for such a state completely disappears. It could be a high stakes showdown at the UN, with uncertain consequences in the aftermath.

Officially, Israel long ago entered into negotiations with Palestinian leaders toward a two-state solution. Unofficially, it appears that the current government in Israel is renouncing this path. Ideological rather than pragmatic factors are clearly contributing to this unofficial but visible renunciation. The most important ideological factor is the belief that Israel deserves the entirety of the land and that Palestinians have no legitimate claim on any part of it.

As you know, this belief is one form of what goes by the name “Zionism.” When it is religiously motivated, it is an especially powerful belief, because Israel’s “title” to every square inch of the land is believed to be granted by God in the Bible. We were told in Israel that the number of religious Jewish Zionists in Israel is today growing appreciably, and that many are to be found in the settlements on Palestinian land (which they do not accept is Palestinian land). It is hard to see how they will ever voluntarily leave their homes, even if Israel signs a peace agreement. In short: Israel has created the conditions for a civil war if they try to dismantle settlements, and for a Palestinian revolt or a wider Middle East war if they never end their occupation.

This letter, though, is not about religious Jewish Zionism and its destructive effects on Israeli policy. It is about the Christian version of the same belief. This Christian version of Zionism matters deeply, not just because theology intrinsically matters, but because it is overwhelmingly clear that American evangelical-fundamentalist Christian Zionism affects US policy toward Israel and the Palestinians in distressing ways. It is one reason why the United States stands almost alone in the world community in supporting Israeli policies which our international friends generally find intolerable if not immoral and illegal.

Not to put too fine a point on it, we wish to claim here that the prevailing version of American Christian Zionism—that is, your belief system—underwrites theft of Palestinian land and oppression of Palestinian people, helps create the conditions for an explosion of violence, and pushes US policy in a destructive direction that violates our nation’s commitment to universal human rights. In all of these, American Christian Zionism as it currently stands is sinful and produces sin. We write as evangelical Christians committed lifelong to Israel's security, and we are seriously worried about your support for policies that violate biblical warnings about injustice and may lead to the outcome you most fear—serious harm to or even destruction of Israel.

We write as evangelicals to you, our fellow evangelicals. On the shared basis of biblical authority, we ask you to reconsider your interpretation of Scripture, for the sake of God, humanity, the United States, and, yes, Israel itself, the Land and People we both love.

I A Question of (Whose) Holy Land

We acknowledge that your evangelical-fundamentalist American Christian Zionism (henceforth simply “Christian Zionism”) is a product of a Christian community that loves and reads the Bible. This is on its face a good thing--for there appear to be fewer and fewer American Christians whose love of the Bible and whose devotion to reading it can be taken for granted. We commend your love for the scriptures.

Both now and in the past, whenever Christian Zionism emerges its essential origin is simply Christian reading of the Hebrew Bible, or what Christians call the Old Testament. Our love of the Bible takes Christians into the pages of the Old Testament; there we cannot help but discover the centrality of a Promised Land for the Jewish people. The trajectory of the canonical Old Testament moves inexorably toward and away from the Promised Land—the patriarchal narratives in which a people and land are promised despite humble origins; enslavement in Egypt; the miraculous Exodus and grim wilderness wanderings under Moses; the conquest of the Promised Land; the establishment, split, and eventual conquest of Israel as a political entity; the Babylonian exile and dispersion of the Jewish people; and a partial return to the land, at which point the OT historical narrative ends.

Our Christian love for and identification with “the Holy Land” can and often does deepen through reading of the New Testament as well. The four Gospels, in particular, detail the journeys of Jesus through (Roman-subjugated) Israel, and many millions of Christians have cut their spiritual teeth on those stories. We have come to know and love Nazareth and Bethlehem, Capernaum and Cana and of course Jerusalem, because those are the places that Jesus walked. Having just visited Israel this summer, we can attest to the continuing power of these places to connect spiritually with Christians in surprisingly profound ways. Both of us found ourselves deeply affected, for example, by standing on the shore of the Sea of Galilee where tradition holds that Jesus reinstated Peter after his denials. The intense spiritual impact of “walking where Jesus walked” continues to draw millions of Christians to Holy Land tours. Even in our jaded age, there is still power in spiritual pilgrimage to Holy Land—the Holy Land.

As devoted Christians, we share this love of the sacred lands of the biblical tradition with all who hold such love. We think that love of the Holy Land is far better than indifference to it. And both of us, as students of the long and terrible history of Christian anti-Semitism, which culminated in the horrors of the Holocaust, far prefer a strong sense of Christian kinship with the Jewish people and their historic homeland than the centuries-long Christian pattern of theological disdain and even hatred that so long predominated. The question then becomes not whether to love “Israel”—understood as the People and the Land—but how best to do so. We think this is a question that you will understand and want to answer properly, as we do.

We suggest to you that contemporary Christian Zionism is well-intentioned but needs correction at some very important points. This requires some careful biblical and theological work—from within the basic framework of evangelical Christianity. This means that the relevant scriptural texts need to be studied in detail, and that Christian theology needs to do its proper work with those texts.

For example, we suggest that Christian Zionists who move from a generalized love of Israel to a specific claim that the contemporary state of Israel has divine title to the entire Holy Land, need to take more seriously the complexity of what the Bible actually says about God’s promises to Abraham.

Genesis 15:18 reads: “On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, ‘To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates.” The next verse goes on to name the various peoples to whom the land belonged at the time.

The territory denoted by the space between these two rivers includes modern-day Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, half of Iraq, half of Egypt, parts of Turkey and Saudi Arabia, the modern state of Israel, as well as the occupied Palestinian territories.

A literal reading of the text that assumes that the descendants of Abram are only the Jewish people faces a problem here. Either God is not very good at keeping his promises, or God’s plan is for contemporary Israel ultimately to conquer all of these other countries and occupy their land. That would result in an Israel ruled by its 90% majority Arabs, or an Israel attempting to subjugate that 90% by force.

But the promise looks very different if we take seriously all of the offspring of Abraham. Genesis 15:4-5 has God taking Abram outside and telling him that his descendants will be as numerous as the stars of the heavens. Genesis 17:4, probably the pivotal text, has God saying to Abraham: “This is my covenant with you: You shall be the ancestor of a multitude of nations.” Many nations, a multitude of nations; many offspring, many kings—read Genesis 17 again and see the plural nouns here.

Close readers of Scripture will know that in fact Abraham did become the father of many nations. With Sarah he became the father of Isaac and the ancestor of all in his line, via Jacob and Esau. With Hagar he became the father of Ishmael and all in his line. And with the long-forgotten Keturah (Gen. 25:1) he became the father of Zimran, Jokshan, Medan, Midian, Ishbak, and Shuah. The Old Testament clearly positions Abraham as the father/ancestor of not only the Jewish people but of a vast number of other peoples, all scattered through the territories promised in Genesis 15. Abraham becomes the father of dozens of peoples, exactly as the Bible says! It is certainly true that the Old Testament primarily tells the story of the line of Isaac and therefore of what became the Jewish people, but that cannot cancel the significance of the promises to Abraham and the many peoples credited to him in Genesis.

The New Testament makes an important move here as well. In Romans 4, Paul says that by faith non-Jews become Abraham’s descendants too: “The purpose was to make him the ancestor of all who believe” (Rom 4:11). Europeans and Asians, Africans and Latin Americans, any who believe in Jesus enter the line of Abraham. This is why it is correct to say that (at least) Jews, Christians, and Muslims are all descendants of Abraham, all part of the Abrahamic family tree, some by birth, some by lineage, some by faith.

Perhaps you will respond by saying that God promises the land of Canaan specifically to the Jewish people. You might cite here Genesis 17:8: “I will give to you, and to your offspring after you, the land where you are now an alien, all the land of Canaan, for a perpetual holding.” This interpretation would require restricting the “offspring” in question to Abraham’s offspring through Sarah via Isaac and then on to Jacob and excluding Esau. But the promise to possess the land includes the offspring of Isaac, and the offspring of Isaac includes Esau, with his five Edomite sons and their offspring, as Genesis 36 states, and that includes multitudes of Canaanites, not only Jews. It would also require the assumption that we know what Gen. 17 means territorially with the term “Canaan” and that it corresponds with the Zionist’s version of the proper boundaries of the modern state of Israel.

One other point from later in the Old Testament seems important to mention here. Even when the narrative moves forward into the book of Joshua, and the twelve tribes of Israel “conquer” the “Promised Land,” it is striking that the scriptures themselves acknowledge the ongoing presence of non-Hebrews in the land. Texts like this recur: “But the people of Judah could not drive out the Jebusites, the inhabitants of Jerusalem; so the Jebusites live with the people of Judah in Jerusalem to this day” (Josh 15:63; compare Josh 13:13, 16:10, 17:12-13, 19:47).

Christians, even those who know their Bibles well, tend to think of the book of Joshua as containing the (bloody) fulfillment of the promise of the whole Land to Israel—the entire land is conquered by war, and then divided up among the tribes. A close reading shows that the Hebrew tribes shared the land for centuries with other groups, and that even when tribes were assigned certain portions of land, they didn’t necessarily control every square inch of it. The point is obvious later when it comes to the challenge posed by the Philistines. It is not an overstatement to say that the Israelite/Hebrew/Jewish people never had exclusive possession of the Holy Land, regardless of whatever divine promises they or we believe that they received.

II Those Who Do Justice Keep Their Land

Let us now assume that God indeed promised the offspring of Abraham and Sarah via Isaac and Jacob a portion of the land between the Nile and the Euphrates. Let us even assume that this promise was intended by God to extend even to our own day and beyond. And let us further assume that in the dark shadow of the Holocaust it was an act of divine grace for a substantial portion of the surviving remnant of the Jewish people to have a modern-day homeland in the contemporary state of Israel. These are substantial assumptions that could be challenged for many reasons, but we are prepared to accept them, along with you.

But we do so while keeping in front of us another strand of relevant biblical teaching. The prophets, writing much later in Israel’s history, long after Israel had established substantial political kingdoms, warned repeatedly that God’s covenant with Israel has a dimension of conditionality to it. Whether preaching in the northern kingdom of Israel prior to the Assyrian conquest, or the southern kingdom of Judah prior to the Babylonian conquest and exile, Israel’s prophets repeatedly warned that God’s covenant promise of the land was conditional on her moral performance. In particular, the prophets warned that, in keeping with the stipulations of the Law, Israel would be judged by her treatment of the aliens in the land, of the poor, the widows, and the orphans.

The 7th/6th century BC prophet Jeremiah sounded such themes consistently. We see it in Jeremiah 6:6-8: “This city must be punished; it is filled with oppression…Violence and destruction resound in her…Take warning, O Jerusalem, or I will turn away from you and make your land desolate so no one can live in it.” Jeremiah 7 is a hugely important passage, in which the prophet warns the complacent worshippers at the seemingly impregnable Temple that it and they would be ruined if they did not “amend your ways and your doings, and let me dwell with you in this place” (Jer 7:3). Jeremiah warned: “Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely…then come and stand before me in this house, which is called by my name, and say, “We are safe!”—only to go on doing all these abominations?” (7:9-10). And the climax: “I will cast you out of my sight, just as I cast out all your kinfolk, all the offspring of Ephraim” (7:15).

Old Testament scholars have long recognized that a powerful, important, and dynamic tension exists in the OT between themes of a conditional and unconditional covenant between God and Israel. God has chosen Israel and made binding promises to her; and yet God has warned Israel that her persistent violation of her part of that covenant could trigger God’s judgment, including in war and in exile. And anyone who reads the Old Testament knows that war and exile came to Israel, that it was prophesied in advance as divine judgment, and described in retrospect in the same way.

At a theological level, we are claiming that even if one accepts a) a divine promise of land to the Jewish people as recorded in scripture, b) a belief that this promise extends even to this day, and c) the modern state of Israel as, in part, God’s gracious fulfillment of this promise, one must also say d) the Bible, in the prophetic writings, also teaches that persistent injustice on the part of Israel has evoked, and still can bring, God’s judgment, which can extend even to war and exile. Israel’s remaining in the land depends on Israel’s now doing justice to Palestinians and making peace with its Arab neighbors that surround Israel. Indeed, Jesus, as prophet and Savior, also prophesied that Jerusalem would be destroyed because they did not know the practices that make for peace (Lk 19:41-44). And Jerusalem was destroyed, 40 years later. Do you not fear that it could happen again? Does not your love of Israel make you want to do all you can to prevent that from happening? And yet your actions actually make it more likely to happen!

III The Holy Land on the Precipice

Any visitor to this tortured Holy Land who avoids a sanitized Christian tour and actually visits with Palestinians, actually stands in the shadow of the Separation Wall, actually sees what military occupation looks and feels like, cannot but tremble at these biblical words of warning.

We are not Old Testament prophets, nor do we pretend to see the future. But we have seen enough to claim that the occupation practices of the modern state of Israel are a direct violation of the most basic biblical moral principles. It is immoral to steal anything, including people’s land, homes, and vineyards. It is immoral to dehumanize people, as occurs daily at Israeli checkpoints. It is immoral to choke people’s freedom and deprive them of their dignity. And it is foolish, a violation of every lesson of history, to think that through sheer intimidation and superior military power a people can be subjugated indefinitely without rising up in resistance or attracting more powerful allies who will do so on their behalf. God gave humanity a recognition of justice and a nearly endless capacity to resist injustice. It is wired into our nature, and the Palestinian people and the neighboring countries have it just like everyone else does.

We genuinely fear that someday someone or some nation inflamed with resentment at the seemingly eternal Israeli subjugation of the Palestinian people will “make your land desolate so no one can live in it” (Jer 6:8). That sounds like a nuclear bomb. Have you heard of Mahmoud Ahmedinijad? While in the Middle East we heard from Palestinian leaders a current commitment to pursue their cause nonviolently. We applaud that commitment. We see it as an extraordinary one under the circumstances. We fear that it cannot last forever, for no people will allow itself to be ground into the dust indefinitely. What are you doing to end their suffering and bring justice to them?

We will leave it to God to sort out with the Jewish people of the modern state of Israel the very complex terms of his covenant with them. But we cannot remain silent about the vast array of American Christians who support the most repressive and unjust Israeli policies in the name of Holy Land and a Holy God. We charge that you bear grave responsibility for aiding and abetting obvious sin, and if Israel once again sees war, we suggest that you will bear part of the responsibility. Christians are called to be peacemakers (Mt 5:9), but by offering uncritical support of current Israeli policies you are actively inflaming the Middle East toward war—in the name of God. This is appalling; it is intolerable; it must stop!

We plead with you, our brothers and sisters, to find a better way, a more biblical way, to love Israel. Love Israel enough to oppose rather than support actions that violate God’s clearly revealed moral will. And while you are at it, it might be good to work on loving the Palestinians, some of whom are also our Christian sisters and brothers. When you visit Israel, we urge you to visit with Palestinian Christians and ask them what they want us, their fellow Christians, to support. For they surely need our love. And we are surely commanded to love them, too.

In the name of Christ,

David P. Gushee, Distinguished University Professor of Christian Ethics, Mercer University
Glen H. Stassen, Smedes Professor of Christian Ethics, Fuller Theological Seminary

Drs. Gushee and Stassen are co-authors of "Kingdom Ethics" (InterVarsity Press) and are members of the board of directors of the New Evangelical Partnership for the Common Good.

Yes to Palestine

2011-09-15T19:52:00.001-07:00

Dear Friend,

You are reading many pros and cons to the (apparent) bid of the PA leadership to recognition by the UN.

I've read many as well. I think we must support it. And the Obama team should as well. We are being two-faced if we don't (and the Palestinians know it, and so are forcing our hand, causing embarrassment if we go through with our (planned) veto in the UN Security Council.

The best summary of the reasons why the US should support the Palestinians in their effort is stated in the following piece in the LA Times by Reza Aslan, (Author of the really fine book, No God But God). In his book, he argues that the West is not in a civilizational conflict, but a conflict for the soul of each religion: a battle between the moderates and radical extremists).

Read it for yourselves. Send it to others. Debate it among ourselves. (I'm still sending stuff "bcc" so we can't have a discussion on this piece). Should you want to post a comment on my blog (below), you are welcome to do it, although few ever do. I archive pieces I send to you there, for referencing).

I read between 30 and 40 articles every day or so, and have cut back sending things out so as not to be a pest.

The situation in Isr/Pal is a microcosm of our ME policies, a window into how we treat other nations there (and in other parts of the world).

With the loss of a Democratic seat in the House to a Republican, President Obama is going to under even more pressure to espouse the Israeli/Likud position (which is to oppose the creation/recognition of a Palestinian state/entity.

Read Mr. Aslan's commentary and profit/prophet by it. Send comments to me and I'll try to summarize the arguments/sentiments of the FPI group (now numbering 180 persons all over the US and the world) and pass them on to "our" group. Peace, justice and love to all, JRK

Yes to Palestine

Reza Aslan
The Los Angeles Times (Opinion)
September 15, 2011 - 12:00am
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-0915-aslan-palestinian-vote...

Later this month, the Palestinian Authority intends to go before the United Nations to request recognition of an independent Palestinian state. Although there is strong backing for the bid, the United States, in the name of supporting Israel, has stated its willingness to use its Security Council veto power to keep the Palestinians from joining the U.N. as a full voting member. The U.S. has also refused to join in a more symbolic General Assembly vote that could change the Palestinians' status from a "nonvoting observer entity" to a "nonvoting observer state."

Here are five reasons why the U.S. should support the Palestinian bid and not exercise its veto at the U.N.

Negotiations have failed.

Two decades of negotiations have not brought the Palestinians a state of their own. Israelis and Palestinians blame each other for the current impasse.

But the question of who is at fault is irrelevant. What matters is that in 1993, when the Oslo accords set up a framework for a negotiated settlement for a two-state solution, there were a little more than 100,000 Israeli settlers living in the West Bank. Now that number stands at more than 300,000. According to the Israeli human rights organization B'Tselem, about half a million Israelis now live "over the Green Line" in what is designated as the future Palestinian state. Every day the Palestinians wait for a negotiated state, another sliver of that state is absorbed into Israel. A few more years and practically nothing will remain.

The current Likud-led Israeli government is unlikely to ever agree to a sovereign Palestinian state.

A decade ago, Benjamin Netanyahu, vying for Likud Party leadership, made his position clear in a speech to the group's central committee: "My friends," he said in 2002, " we must present the situation in the clearest possible way: We won't lend a hand to the establishment of a Palestinian state west of the Jordan River.... We must vote as one in favor of the draft resolution against a Palestinian state."

It is true that seven years later, under intense pressure from the Obama administration, Netanyahu, as Israeli prime minister, grudgingly accepted the notion of a Palestinian state in principle. But the unprecedented conditions he called for — that it have no military, no control over its borders, no capital in East Jerusalem, no right of return for Palestinian refugees and that it recognize Israel as a "Jewish state" — seemed deliberately designed to negate the possibility of true Palestinian sovereignty.

Even if Netanyahu were to begin pushing for a Palestinian state, it is highly unlikely that his ultra-right-wing coalition would allow him to succeed. Indeed, immediately after Netanyahu's 2009 speech, powerful members of his party demanded that he retract his statement entertaining the possibility of a Palestinian state. As one of Likud's most influential Knesset members, Danny Danon, vowed: "I will attempt to cause this sentence, which was said under American pressure, never to come into being."

President Obama has utterly failed to advance the Middle East peace process.

Obama came into office vowing a more active and evenhanded approach to the Israeli-Palestinian crisis. Yet beyond a few lofty speeches about Palestinian suffering, he has offered no substantive policy shifts or specific proposals for moving negotiations forward. Obama's attempt to temporarily stop Israel from building settlements in the occupied territories backfired when he caved in to Israeli intransigence. The administration then had the nerve to veto a nonbinding U.N. resolution condemning the very settlements Obama himself had condemned. The president's barely newsworthy suggestion that negotiations for a two-state solution be based on the 1967 borders with land swaps (which, as the basis for the Oslo accords, has been the principle advanced, if not publicly announced, by every U.S. president since Jimmy Carter) was ridiculed by the Israeli prime minister, and in the Capitol building, no less. The president's kowtowing to Netanyahu and the Israeli right wing has made the U.S. look weak on the global stage. If for no other reason than to prove to the world that the U.S. is not Israel's lap dog, the president should refrain from vetoing a Palestinian state.

Contrary to popular belief, it is not political suicide to defy the will of Israel.

There is no doubt that American public opinion remains overwhelmingly pro-Israel. But polls show that the majority of Americans believe the U.S. should not favor one side over the other in the conflict. Among thoughtful leaders in the media, military and foreign affairs, there has been a consensus that our policy toward Israel is severely damaging America's interests and image around the world. According to a 2008 J Street poll, 78% of American Jews said they supported a two-state solution and 81% wanted the U.S. to pressure both sides to end the conflict.

Of course, the Republicans will try to paint Obama and the Democrats as "anti-Israel" if the president fails to veto the U.N. vote. But this has been a consistent strategy on the part of the GOP for years, and it has always failed. In any case, the same J Street poll found that only 8% of Jews cite Israel as an issue in deciding whom to vote for for president.

Palestinians are doing almost exactly what Israelis did 60 years ago.

Israel maintains that the Palestinians cannot declare statehood and seal it through the U.N. Yet the Palestinians are merely following the trail blazed by Israel six decades ago. In 1948, after the U.N. voted for the partition of Palestine, debate among the world powers about how to divide the land dragged on and violence between Jews and Arabs grew worse. The Jewish Agency simply preempted negotiations and unilaterally declared the state of Israel; the United States immediately recognized it, and the U.N. accepted Israeli sovereignty the following year.

The Palestinian Authority has come to the same conclusion that the Jews apparently came to in 1948: Negotiations will not lead to an independent state; the only way forward is unilateral action. By rejecting that strategy outright, Israel is not only being hypocritical; it is invalidating its own existence as a state.

There is one more reason to support the Palestinians' bid at the United Nations. It is the moral thing to do. During his first presidential campaign, Obama said, "Nobody is suffering more than the Palestinian people." Now, he has the opportunity to live up to his own beliefs and promises, and to provide the Palestinian people with the same sense of dignity that Harry Truman gave Israel 60 years ago.

Notice NONVIOLENCE!

2011-09-12T08:53:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,
Julia Bacha, a Brazilian filmmaker has documented the demonstration at the Palestinian village of Budrus.
Watch her talk that describes it and the difference it can make. JRK

Here's the link

9/11 Plus Ten from Jim Wallis

2011-09-08T13:55:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend

Relations between Arab Palestinians and Israelis has suffered because of missteps in US Middle East policies since 9/11.

Sojourners' Jim Wallis strikes the right drum in his assessment, part of which I want to make sure you read. JRK

10 Years After 9/11: The Good and the Bad

. . . .And in those first days following 9/11, America, not the terrorists, had the high ground. The world did not identify with those who cruelly and murderously decided to take innocent lives in response to their grievances -- both real and imagined. Instead, the world identified with a suffering America -- even the front cover of the French newspaper Le Monde ran the headline, "We are all Americans now."

But it was Washington's response that I was most worried about. Within a short period of time, the official reaction to terrorism would simply be defined as war -- a decade of it -- resulting in many more innocent casualties than on September 11, 2001. In response to America's own suffering, many others in Afghanistan, Iraq, and around the world would now suffer --all in the name of our war on terrorism. The opportunity for deeper understanding, reflection, and redirection would elude us as we sought to erase our vulnerability with the need to demonstrate our superior force and power. This was done quite easily in the early days of both our new wars. But now, we see that the longest series of wars in American history has failed to resolve or reverse the causes of the violence that struck us, or to make us safer. They just made it all worse.

The world expected and would have supported a focused and sustained effort to pursue and bring this small band of criminals to justice. But these last 10 years of manipulated and corrupted intelligence, endless war, practices and policies of torture, secret armies of assassination, global violations of human rights, indiscriminate violence with countless civilian casualties, and trillions of dollars wasted caused America to lose the high ground long ago. The arrogance of American power was our only response to the both the brutality and complexity of terrorism. Perhaps, this arrogance is most recently and brazenly exhibited in former Vice-President Dick Cheney's new book tour, where he boasts of having absolutely no regrets for any of the momentous decisions he took part in. These are decisions which have made the world an even more divided, polarized, dehumanized, and dangerous place -- 10 years after September 11, 2001.

But, fortunately, the official and failed response of Washington to the terrible tragedy of 9/11 has not been the only reponse. A new generation of Christians has asked how Jesus would respond to these same events. Many of them would agree with what Methodist Bishop Will Willimon recently said in the evangelical magazine Christianity Today: "American Christians may look back upon our response to 9/11 as our greatest Christological defeat … when our people felt vulnerable, they reached for the flag instead of the cross." As many of those who have grown up in the decade since 9/11 confront the conflicts of their world, they are reaching for different things than their government. They are forging alternative responses to issues of injustice and violence, and rejecting the terrorism and war sequence of Washington's twisted and failed moral logic.

And despite the hateful diatribes of fundamentalist leaders in all our religious traditions, other pastors have decided to love their neighbors, and even their enemies in response to Jesus' call. Their stories are slowly being told, from American neighborhoods where Muslims have moved in, to conflict areas around the world where faith is being used for bridge building and healing, instead of more revenge killings. Christian leaders are sharing meals, fasting, and prayer with Muslim leaders. Some have defended each other's congregations and homes in the face of heated threats and rhetoric. While differences between faith traditions are not being glossed over, the nature of a loving and reconciling God is being courageously affirmed across religious lines. In all of this, we are saying that government responses need not define our own.

Last weekend, my son Luke just turned 13 years old, and my son Jack is now eight years old. They both understand what Christianity and Islam are and are not. In their classrooms, they have friends who are Muslim. The other day, my son Jack, who missed the events of 9/11, heard a disparaging remark on television about Islam and quickly retorted, "That's not true, there is a Muslim boy in my class, and he is not like that at all." Luke and I recently watched the National Geographic special, which described the events of the day that we remember this week. It helped him to put the pieces in place from his memories of 9/11 as a three-year-old. I was struck with how he looks at the world with more sympathy than fear, and how strongly he feels about war's inability to solve any of the problems and conflicts between people.

Last year, the actions of extremists marred the commemoration of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and ignited international violence. This year, many interfaith services will mark the 10th anniversary. Sojourners is co-sponsoring a press conference with the World Evangelical Alliance on Friday, September 9, which will overlook Ground Zero in New York City. Global Evangelical leaders will be calling for peace and unity, and we will say that while religion has historically been the cause of conflict, it can also serve as a solution. We will give examples of Christians and Muslims living together peacefully, even in the most conflicted parts of the world, and call for Christians to be good neighbors to the Muslim community. As we gather in our houses of worship this Sunday, September 11, many pastors will remind their parishioners of two fundamental truths: We must not be overcome by evil, but rather overcome evil with good, and "they will know we are Christians by our love."

Jim Wallis is the author of Rediscovering Values: A Guide for Economic and Moral Recovery, and CEO of Sojourners. He blogs at www.godspolitics.com. Follow Jim on Twitter @JimWallis.

The Correct Spirit for Isr/Pal

2011-08-29T18:21:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,
Here is the right spirit that should characterize Muslim/Jewish/Christian relationships. Despite our severe differences, we have love for God and others in common. JRK

A Tennessee Church Welcomes its Muslim Neighbors
by Bob Smietana 08-19-2011
Rev. Steve Stone was just trying to be a good neighbor.

Two years ago, the pastor of Heartsong Church in Cordova, Tennessee, on the outskirts of Memphis, learned that a local mosque had bought property right across the street from the church. So he decided some Southern hospitality was in order.

A few days later, a sign appeared in front of the church. “Heartsong Church welcomes Memphis Islamic Center to the neighborhood,” it read.

That small act of kindness was the start of an unlikely friendship between the two congregations, one that made headlines around the world. Members of the mosque and church have shared meals together, worked at a homeless shelter, and become friends over the past two years. When Stone learned that his Muslim friends needed a place to pray for Ramadan because their building wasn’t ready, he opened up the doors of the church and let them hold Ramadan prayers there.

Critics said that Stone was a heretic for allowing people of another faith to pray in his church building. He says he’s just doing what Jesus taught him to do. “Jesus told us to love our neighbors,” Stone told Sojourners. “These people are actually neighbors.”

The friendship between Heartsong and the Memphis Islamic Center comes at a time when Muslim-Christian relations have been testy. In communities from New York to California, from Wisconsin to Tennessee, proposed mosques have run into angry, organized opposition.

Isaelis are People too! Tx to Brad Burston!

2011-08-22T17:39:00.000-07:00

Terror, racism, and the idea that Israelis are people too
Bradley Burston
Haaretz (Opinion)
August 22, 2011 - 12:00am
http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/a-special-place-in-hell/terror-racism-and-the-idea-...

In the aftermath of a terror operation in which gunmen attacked several fronts in southern Israel, killing eight people and wounding dozens more, try this sentence on for size: "Israelis are people, too."

What’s your first reaction? If you've been around this block before, it may well be something akin to suspicion. It is, after all, a sentence with an ax to grind. Why else would anyone need to say something like that at all?

Here's one reason: You can bet that terrible things are about to happen, with Gaza being the imminent target of Israeli retaliation. The next step will be a ritual bifurcation of sympathy, either exclusively for Israeli victims of the Thursday attacks, or exclusively for the Gazans to follow.

There will even be scorn for those who suggest that innocent victims are innocent victims no matter who they are – an observation which will quickly be written off by some (at the bottom of this article) as mendacious moral equivalence, or willful ignorance of the obvious malice and evildoing of one side – take your pick – toward the other.

Which brings us back to that statement, simpleminded as it may sound, alleging that Israelis are people, too. It came to mind because at the time I heard about the attacks, I happened to be reading an article on racism in Israel by Palestinian author and activist Omar Barghouti, a driving force behind the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign.

Referring to a Hebrew University professor's study of racist attitudes in Israeli education, to be published in Britain this month, Barghouti wrote: "This insightful research by respected Israeli scholar Nurit Peled-Elhanan will confirm what Palestinian researchers have always known: Israel's prevailing culture of racism, fundamentalism, support for war crimes, and apartheid against Palestinians is mainly a product of an educational system that indoctrinates Jewish-Israeli students with militant colonial values and extreme racism that turn them into 'monsters' once in uniform."

Barghouti concludes that "more BDS is needed to end Israeli occupation, colonialism and apartheid. Other than the obvious benefits to indigenous Palestinians," he writes on Mondoweiss.net, "an end to this system of oppression may well transform most Israelis from colonial 'monsters' into normal humans."

Barghouti's use of the word monster, taken from remarks by Peled-Elchanan quoted in The Guardian ("People ask how can these nice Jewish boys and girls become monsters once they put on a uniform.") sheds light on a question which bears further examination.
All but obscured in the endless debate over whether criticism of Israel constitutes anti-Semitism – a debate now tearing a hole in the leadership of the American Jewish Committee – is a little-discussed but no less significant companion issue: When opposition to Israeli policies crosses the line into hatred and dark stereotyping of Israelis as a whole, does this not constitute racism?

Do those who hate Israel and what it does, which is certainly their right, also enjoy a moral exemption that allows bigotry against Israelis as Israelis?

It seems to me that people who justly fight racism have a responsibility not to practice it. It is all too natural a matter, especially in this part of the world, for anger over hated policies to boil over into racism against an entire people.

We've seen what that does. We've seen what that enables. We're about to see it again. By the time these words see print, more innocent people are going to die. They are not the enemy, faceless, merciless, heartless and monstrous.

They are people, too.

Re-stating FPI Intentions

2011-08-12T18:30:00.000-07:00

FPI Position Paper, August 9, 2011
John R. Kleinheksel Sr.
A direct challenge to my apparent commitment to the “One-State” position has led to a fresh reassessment of what I and “Friends of Palestinians and Israelis” are all about The introduction to a post on August 6, 2011 by Sam Bahour was titled: “Two-States is Dead; Long Live One State”. One of my good friends took heated exception. This statement addresses that question. I’m sorry now I got carried away by a sudden burst of ardor for the One-State position. One State (secular and democratic); Two states (side by side in peace and security); Three states, four states: Right now, these are political games being played. I don’t want to go there.
The deeper issue (for me) is how we treat each “other”, whether with dignity, each person having the right to exist on the face of the land in freedom and equality; or with fear, distrust, and hostility, using previous offenses as ammunition to fence “the other” off. That is the underlying issue. Every essay, link, article, book review, anecdote that appears from now on in FPI will and must encourage people to treat each person with dignity instead of like dirt: Palestinians treating Israelis as persons on a valid journey to authentic existence; Israelis treating Palestinians as persons on a valid journey to self-determination. No more, no less. This is a battle for hearts and minds that is a real battle. Without winning here, there will be neither a One-State nor a Two-State solution. If all we “see” is a thief or a “terrorist”, there will be neither security nor peace.
Now I know that systemic injustice must be adjudicated. Segregated lunch counters and busses needed to be outlawed in the US and personal relationships were affected because of those systemic changes. That too, is an important battle to be waged in the struggle for “equality” (and J Street, the American Task Force on Palestine, the Obama administration and many others are still working hard to make the “Two-State” solution happen). If that is their battle, so be it. Others are working for a one-state solution with freedom and equality for all. On the surface, it is a longer reach. From before 1948, Jewish leaders have feared losing the “Jewish” character of their homeland because of demographic trends. Can this be solved? It MUST and can be solved, to the satisfaction of all parties that make up “the land”. But not without treating grievances with a listening ear and heart, reaching understanding and wisdom.
It’s been a neighborhood brawl especially since the 1920s when each tribe tried to accommodate one another and failed, again and again, building competing “narratives” that served as bludgeons against the validity of the “other’s” existence, dignity and rights.
FPI joins forces with Israeli and Palestinian persons and entities that are shifting the paradigm from competition (warfare) to cooperation (reconciliation). This is the human dimension that is concomitant with any political solution. Looking each other in the eye. Getting to know one another. Seeing each other as fellow human beings with hopes and dreams. Walking in each other’s shoes. Learning each other’s stories. Laughing and crying together. Seeing things about ourselves that are hard to admit publically, because of ridicule, misrepresentation and rejection by “extremists”. And being public about it anyway.
Perhaps you can understand why the stark egalitarian appeal of the One-State position (living together equally), swept me away the other day. Forgive me. It is of course, “impossible”; for now. Of course, the Two-State solution is impossible as well. Who is holding the high cards?
Don’t you think I know how “impossible” this is politically for those who dreamed of a “Jewish homeland” in the late 1800s: the Zionist dream (secular, by the way) of a homeland “of our own” taking historical form among other nations in the world? How do we give up that dream? How do we modify that dream to accommodate the people we find in the land? How successful has the experiment been, especially since 1967 when we occupied huge swaths of land the international community declared was meant for “the other” people living there? And in 1948, driving out the native inhabitants and forcing them into refugee status or to be second-class citizens in a country no longer their own?
I will speak for myself. I need to do a better job of getting to know more Israelis and Palestinians who are sick and tired of the adversarial stereotypes being perpetuated. I want to redouble efforts to make friends with “the other” who also have dreams, dignity, disappointments and heartache and let you know about persons who are making a difference. Be they Jewish, Muslim or Christian, Druze or whoever.
I really like Eugene Peterson’s translation of Psalm 51:8. The older translation goes something like “a sacrifice acceptable to God is a contrite heart; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise”. Peterson says it better: Heart-shattered lives ready for love/don’t for a moment escape God’s notice.
I’m always looking for those little cracks in armor-plated facades that admit to being human and vulnerable; cracks that drop tears of empathy, joy and sadness when in each other’s presence. FPI is dedicated to finding those stories of brothers and sisters in the human family who find a peace the rest of the world neither seeks nor understands. This is the heart of any religion worth practicing.
I will always lift up The Parents Circle (www.theparentscircle.com), Musalaha (Salim Munayer), SABEEL, (Naim Ateek); No More Enemies (Deb Reich); Holy Land Trust (Sami Awad); Christians for Middle East Peace (CMEP); Mark Braverman (www.markbraverman.org) and many others who are breaking new ground in personal relationships.

Two State solution: Dead. Long Live One State!

2011-08-06T07:08:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,

I have long thought the so-called "Two State" solution to the Isr/Pal conflict was DEAD. Our "friend", Sam Bahour concurs (see below).

On the eve of official Palestinian leadership's decision to seek their "independence" inside Israel/Palestine, I send you businessman Sam Bahour's assessment and call for "One State, with liberty and justice for all". Well, that's not a direct quote, but it surely is the full intent of his editorial in the Guardian, (faithfully sleuthed out by our friends at ATFP, who are still, by the way, committed to the "Two State" solution. I give them credit for passing on Sam's critique and call.)

More and more of our "friends" are pressing the Israelis (and US) to widen their view of who a "citizen" of Israel is. Repeated calls to recognize Israel as a "Jewish State" are anachronistic, ethnic-centered, and saturated in religious settlement-driven orthodoxy. Surely this form of "A Jewish Republic" is equally as heinous as their constant criticism of Iran's "Islamic Republic". What's the difference? None. Competing orthodoxies, fused with religious fervor, won't lead any to the Promised Land, "living together equally" (as Sam Bahour puts it at the end of his opinion piece below).

The US model of a secular democracy is still the best model there is for Isr/Pal. We in the US must continue to insist on greater true democracy in that region, even though it means going up against "the Jewish State" of Bibi's Likud party, their sympathizers in the US political action committee AIPAC (and even J Street, still wanting to beat the Two-State Dead Horse). Every "state" has its "neighborhoods", but their must be some form of "confederation" that gives basic human equality to all citizens. Such equality does not now exist and few seem to be working at changing that condition!

BDS (boycott, divestment and sanctions movement) should be aimed at Israeli companies who are profiting from the Apartheid-like policies, from confiscated land, depriving Palestinian participation in production and services from "their" land and energies. Read on and ponder, JRK

Palestinians will soon come full circle

Years have been wasted making concessions to their colonisers. Palestinians were right to call for a secular state at the outset

By Sam Bahour

The Guardian - Thursday - August 4, 2011

The Palestinian national liberation movement has reached its end. As the Palestinian leadership – if there is such a legitimate body today – prepares to bring the issue of statehood to the UN this September, the weeks and months ahead will witness the last desperate attempt to get the international community to assume their responsibilities and ensure that a Palestinian state becomes a reality in the occupied territories.

The reasons for the failure of the Palestinian national liberation movement are many. First and foremost, the shellshock that the creation of Israel caused among Palestinians in 1948 has never really gone away. Half of the Palestinian population at the time were displaced from their homes.

Those that refused to flee are today citizens of Israel – a citizenship that was not requested, but rather imposed upon them – and comprise more than 1.2 million people, Muslims and Christians.

As if the forced dispossession from 78% of their homeland was not enough, the Israeli military occupied the remaining parts of Palestine in 1967. Israel had planned for that occupation long before the war. Military occupation is, by definition, regarded as a temporary state of affairs – and one would be stretching the definition to the point of fantasy to consider Israel's presence in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem as still temporary after 44 years. Reality is much more accurately described as the crime of apartheid than that of military occupation.

Beginning in the early 1970s, the Palestinians became, as former Palestinian diplomat Afif Safieh put it, "unreasonably reasonable". Year after year the Palestinian leadership offered concession after concession, trying to reach an equitable resolution to their dispossession and military occupation.

This seemingly never-ending chain of concessions culminated in what is known as the 1993 Oslo peace accords. These accords were a seriously lopsided bilateral agreement between the PLO and Israel, which attempted to bring the parties to a "final status agreement" within five years.

The Oslo accords kept the system of military occupation in place and simply codified the unsustainable imbalance between an occupying power (Israel) and an occupied people (the Palestinians). The accords failed, miserably and multiple times. Not only did a final agreement never happen, but today we are further from a two-state solution than ever before. No amount of 11th-hour wordsmithing by Barack Obama or Binyamin Netanyahu around reviving negotiations by setting a starting point for discussing borders is acceptable. Past procrastination has only created irreparable damage on the ground invoking a dire need for an end game, not yet another starting point.

After struggling to revive the peace process for two decades, the Palestinians have lost faith in the process as well as in those tasked with overseeing it, namely the Quartet – United States, Russia, the EU and the UN. For the entire period of the peace process, Israel ploughed forward with more land confiscations, more settlement building, more death and more destruction.

Any honest observer would reach a clear conclusion that Israel has no intention of allowing the Palestinians to create a new reality on the ground towards a feasible, workable resolution of the crisis. Nor are the powers that be, namely the US and EU, serious about ending the conflict on the basis of international law. Diplomacy has utterly failed the Palestinians, leaving them with less land and less water, more fragmented, poorer, in disunity, and with fading hopes.

The drama unfolding as we head towards September revolves around a simple equation. Those who claim to be the Palestinian leadership have no more tricks up their sleeves to justify remaining in negotiations with their occupier. Thus, they are taking what is being portrayed as a strategic move to apply for membership of the state of Palestine in the UN.

The underlying political fact they are trying to re-establish is that the resolution to this seemingly insoluble conflict is two states, Israel and Palestine, based on UN general assembly resolution 181, which in 1947 partitioned Palestine (illegally, I might add).

This move gets an "A" for effort but is doomed to fail even if Palestine is admitted into the UN this year, next year, in five years or not at all. The realities on the ground have changed drastically since 1947. Israel, with blind US support, has succeeded in removing a two-state solution from the feasible options.

The new Palestinian leaders, those whom the Israeli negotiators have not yet met, see the larger picture and refuse to believe that Israel desires to live in peace when every indication for 64 years has shown the opposite. The emerging Palestinian leaders see Israel for what it is: a settler, colonial, apartheid movement clinging to a racialist, exclusivist ideology that neither wishes nor intends to allow another state to emerge between the Mediterranean sea and the Jordan river, let alone allowing Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and be compensated for their hardships, as was stipulated as a condition when the UN accepted Israel as a member state on 11 May 1949.

Once this foredoomed move toward Palestinian membership in the UN runs its course, a new paradigm will take root, one that Israel dreads because it implicitly views Palestinians and Israelis as equals, as co-citizens, as partners. This new shift will see Palestinians dropping their desire for independent statehood in a fraction of their historic homeland and instead will find them, within a genuinely representative political structure, articulating their desire for self-determination within their historic homeland, even if that homeland today is called Israel.

The Palestinians are about to come full circle. They were correct, painfully so, to call for a secular democratic state at the outset of this conflict. Sadly, they wasted precious time and lost too many lives trying to accept unjust modalities of a resolution.

Now, the sooner Palestinians and Israelis realise that our destiny is to live together as equals, the sooner we can begin to rehabilitate our communities and build a single society whose citizens are all equal under law and equal as human beings.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/aug/04/palestinians-secular-state

NO MORE ENEMIES!

2011-08-02T19:51:00.000-07:00

Friend,
Here is the complete review of Deb Reich's NO MORE ENEMIES, JRK

A review of Deborah Reich’s NO MORE ENEMIES, available from Amazon.com
John R. Kleinheksel (www.friendsofpalestiniansandisraelis.blogspot.com)
Our culture is more and more polarized. We accuse “others” of our woes, unable to see “the enemy” is we. One of the key issues of our time is how to build bridges to “others” instead of walls. How will be refuse to treat persons as “enemies”, turning them into partners? It's true in other cultures. It's true in Israel/Palestine.

With characteristic clarity, Martin Marty skewers the chattering class in re the Anders Breivik massacre in Norway. The world jumped to the conclusion that a Muslim extremist must have done it. O no, wait, he was a Christian extremist! “No, this is not one of us”. Left untended, we demonize Muslims or Christians, or Jews, and keep them at arm’s length, to isolate or even eliminate them. He concludes his “Sightings” column for August 1, 2011 with this illuminating paragraph:
The back-and-forth polemics continues. To what point? Each “side” finds it important and urgent to use a broad brush to paint the “other” most monstrously, in order to deflect criticism from themselves and to assure themselves of their own virtue. That obscures what should be a clear-eyed critique of “self-and-other” among all when clarity is so important. The instant and inaccurate portrayal of “the other” makes the self look good in his or her own eyes. It does not provide the accurate data about. . .the people we need to understand more than we need to fire people up, motivated by Islamophobia and Christianophobia, neither of which needs more heat in our flammable or inflammable world.

I’ve discovered a working mom in Israel, who is determined to do something about it. Somehow (perhaps through Sam Bahour), Deb Reich got on my FPI list (Friends of Palestinians and Israelis) and offered to send me a copy of her recently published book, NO MORE ENEMIES (NME). I’ve read it and recommend it to all persons seeking to advance Israeli/Palestinian reconciliation efforts. She refuses to be anybody’s “enemy”.

Born in Manhattan, educated at Barnard College, Ms Reich is a single Israeli mom, raising two children in Karkur, a small town near the Mediterranean coast. With single-minded determination, she is working to reconcile Israelis and Palestinians Arabs by building lasting friendships with “the enemy”, making them “partners” instead of adversaries. And she’s networking with scores of individuals and groups seeking to transcend literal and relational barriers.

There are four parts to her 383 page book. Part I seeks to explain NME, that “the very notion of enemies is obsolete” (p. 3). In Part II, she seeks to apply her vision to Israelis and Palestinians, giving many “stories” (Part III) of how to “live behind enemy lines”, drawn from her own experiences with friends, neighbors and colleagues between 1981 (when she moved to Israel) and 2010.

Throughout the book, she hammers home her thesis that “the enemies paradigm simply does not promote good solutions. The ‘other group’ is the partner you need in order to fix what’s broken” (p. 212). Part IV gives a smorgasbord of practical suggestions of actions to take, websites to visit, and agencies and entities that are working toward the NME paradigm. She advocates creating a literal “Toolbox” with items/objects to remind us of the many ways we can address “the other”. It is an invitation to a “transformation process” that has taken her “40 years to figure out” (p. 268).

As a fair-minded Christian I truly admire Deb Reich’s wholehearted commitment to “liberate the latent cooperation bound up in dysfunctional relationships [with] ‘enemies’” (p. 271). She knows it takes “energy”, the energy latent in each of us, to get this done (Christians would say it comes from the “one” who helps us love our enemies like he did!) She also knows it is we who are often our own worst enemies. It is we who need transformation.

Here is a typical brilliant flash of insight that sparkles throughout the book:
If you take part in systematically oppressing or disenfranchising or discounting a whole group of people over a long time, you are not merely depriving them unfairly of . . .basic human rights, you are also binding up their vital, mysterious human energy (and much of your own) in a sterile and ugly cycle of joint struggle, suffering and death (p. 270.)

I want my readers to be introduced to just a few of the websites Ms Reich has suggested, as windows into groups that are contributing to turning enemies into partners.

Women Organization for Political Prisoners: www.wofpp.org This is a group of women united in their opposition to the Israeli occupation. They wish to support (listed) women political prisoners incarcerated for opposing the occupation.

The Madaa Community Center in Silwan: www.madaasilwan.org is a Palestinians community center established in 2007. Silwan is just outside the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City, occupied by Israel. They are using nonviolent techniques in the struggle to avoid displacement. They are promoting dialogue and training youth for leadership.

Artsbridge Institute: www.artsbridgeinstitute.org Artsbridge creates a safe space for shared self-revelation while staying with the language of empathy, curiosity and compassion. It was used productively at Wahat al Salam – Neve Shalom, near Jerusalem in 2010.

Compassionate Listening: www.compassionatelistening.org teaches listening skills to create powerful cultures of peace. Their next delegation to Israel/Pal is March 18-28, 2012.

School for Peace: www.nswas.org Ms Reich has translated their Israeli/Palestinian Identities in Dialogue: The School for Peace Approach, available from their website.
Rabbis for Human Rights: www.rhr.org.il The lead article by Rab Yishai Ron, alone is worth a visit to this site.

Israeli Committee Against House Demolition: www.icahdusa.org Born in the USA, Jeff Halper has long sought to advance a just peace between Israel and the Palestinians based on coexistence and human rights. He patiently, persistently works for an end to the occupation of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem.

When I asked her where she got this deep desire to turn enemies into partners, she referred me to a column she wrote in 2002 to explain it:
Up Xenophilia
Nearly everyone’s heard of xenophobia (fear and loathing of foreigners and their strange ways), but what about its obverse -- xenophilia? I checked an unabridged dictionary, and there it was. Xenophile: someone attracted to things and people strange and foreign… as this columnist has always been.
Well, maybe not always; is it genetic, or learned? To teach us world history, my 4th grade teacher, Miss Ladd, organized a creative multinational food fair -- way to go, Miss Ladd! Every kid in the class chose a country, and the moms pitched in to help (dads didn’t cook yet in 1957). One fine day we must all have gathered in the classroom and eaten our merry way around the globe, though uncharacteristically I have no memory of the repast, or even of my family’s contribution. Still, my xenophilous tendencies seem to have crystallized by the 4th grade.
Xenophilia isn’t an intrinsically Jewish impulse, maybe; but it’s not a sin, either. Most people are evidently happiest sticking with their own kind, without a fuss. Relatively few seem to find foreign ways either irresistibly fascinating or intolerably threatening. Alas, the Philes tend to become anthropologists and the Phobes, politicians. Pick any nation: With its xenophiles safely shipped off to some aboriginal hinterland or busy in academe, the xenophobes in government get busy rallying the masses to make war on the neighbors (and the neighbors likewise, of course). Maybe we need a Society for the Promotion of Xenophilia in Government (unless what passes for our legislature has already made it illegal).
“That there are men in all countries who get their living by war, and by keeping up the quarrels of nations, is as shocking as it is true,” wrote Thomas Paine in 1792; “but when those… in the government… make it their study to sow discord, and cultivate prejudices between nations, it becomes the more unpardonable.” Well said, old boy.

Deb Reich is a courageous Israeli mother, consistently working in her homeland for an end to seeing “the other” as an “enemy”. She is not alone. The cascade of voices, the pounding of feet, the working hands and open arms are increasing, some day to transform the lives and landscape of the present “unholy” land. Dear lady, may your anti-tribal tribe increase!

Working Toward Reconcilation, Salim Munayer

2011-07-27T18:21:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,
I'll be giving more details from Deb Reich's new book: NO MORE ENEMIES, but first this from the Musalaha director, Salim Munayer. Pray for peace and reconcilation; learning each other's narrative and working for rapproachment. JRK

The Urgency of Reconciliation
by Salim Munayer

As Israeli and Palestinian believers, we usually focus on our theological differences, but we are unaware of the greater political and societal differences. Recently, I was speaking with one of my colleagues from the Hebrew University, a professor who has done a lot of work on bringing Israelis and Palestinians together. We were discussing the different challenges that these sort of inter-group meetings face, and the lack of hope that people have in the prospect of reconciliation. This led us to talk about the new report by Sammy Smooha, a professor of sociology at Haifa University and one of Israel’s preeminent scholars of Israeli-Palestinian relations, especially within the State of Israel. He recently published a report through the United States Institute of Peace, called Arab-Jewish Relations in Israel, Alienation and Rapprochement[1]. It is an informed look at the shift in attitudes over the past few decades, as well as the current situation, and suggests a number of policy changes that should be made to help reconciliation as we go forward.

Smooha first points out that Israeli society is fragmented on a number of different levels. He writes, “Israel is a deeply divided society. The division between Arab and Jewish citizens is reflected in institutions; culture; national identity; socioeconomic status; and stances on the character of the state, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and other fundamental issues.”[2] Furthermore, Palestinian-Israelis,

[R]eject Zionism, the de facto state ideology of Israel. They see Zionism, the Jewish movement of national liberation, as colonialist and racist, and they denigrate the Jews’ fundamental Zionist collective identity. The Jews, meanwhile, do not see themselves as colonial settlers but rather as the genuine proprietors of the Land of Israel, from which they were historically exiled and to which they rightfully returned to find alien Arabs in possession . . . Both sides reject the most cherished values of the other.[3]

This division is important, because the Palestinians in Israel make up a very significant minority; one in six Israeli citizens are Arab, and they make up around 17 per cent of the total population (excluding the Palestinian Territories). Smooha explains that there are two different theories on the Arab-Jewish relations within Israel, mutual alienation and mutual rapprochement. The mutual alienation theory states that the two communities are on a violent collision course, while the mutual rapprochement theory claims that they are in the process of adjusting to each other. He then looks at the period from 1996 to 2010 and discusses some of the developments that took place, in light of these two theories. “By either account,” he writes, “any account in fact, this was a lost decade for Arab-Jewish coexistence. The situation has worsened and bodes badly for the future of their relations.”[4]

For example, Smooha discusses the collapse of the Oslo accords and the beginning of the Second Intifada, as well as the October Events in 2000, when Israeli police killed thirteen Palestinian-Israelis in protests that took place across the country. Smooha also looks at the steep rise in popularity of right wing political parties such as Yisrael Betenu, and the proposed measures to require loyalty oaths, and to criminalize participation in Nakba Day memorial ceremonies. Although these measures were not passed, they affected Arab-Jewish relations within Israel and indicate the level of animosity between the two communities. Among Palestinian-Israelis, the voting rate has dropped from 75 per cent in 1999 to 53 per cent in 2009, and contains an element of boycott that demonstrates a withdrawal from Israeli society. The Palestinian-Israelis that do vote have increasingly supported Arab parties that advocate a bi-national state that would no longer be Jewish.[5] Smooha also includes the results of his survey on attitudes towards reconciliation, and they do not paint a rosy picture. 43 per cent of Palestinian Israelis are not ready to have a Jewish neighbor, and 50 per cent of Jewish Israelis are not ready to have an Arab neighbor.[6] All of these trends represent a growing hostility between these two communities.

For Smooha, real progress will only be made when a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is found, and when Palestinian-Israelis are integrated into mainstream Israeli society. Unfortunately, no progress was made on either of these fronts in the past decade. In spite of this lack of progress, however, Smooha is optimistic. He sides with the mutual rapprochement theory, and believes that we can still reach coexistence and reconciliation, but only if we are willing to work for it. If nothing is done to bring about change, the only result will be further alienation, destruction and violence. We cannot afford to “postpone change until peace is concluded,” we must “take steps immediately to improve Arab-Jewish coexistence” if we are to “preclude further deterioration that might impede peace.”[7]

This is encouraging, and serves as an affirmation of those who work for reconciliation. But it is also a warning. As believers, we are by no means immune to the destructive traits that mark our respective communities, and all of the factors that have further entrenched the divisions in the past decade have also affected us. We may disagree on how to go about reaching reconciliation, but we do still have hope for an improvement of our relations, and we have our shared faith in the Messiah who calls us to dwell in unity as brothers and sisters. If nothing is done to restore the relationships that have been damaged, there are dark days ahead, and this is why it is crucial that we allow God to use us as an instrument of his peace. We are called to be peacemakers, and stand against division, hatred, and violence with love.

Salim J. Munayer, Ph.D., is director of Musalaha, a ministry of reconciliation.

Palestinian Statehood Long Overdue

2011-07-19T19:12:00.001-07:00

Dear Friend,

Saliba Sarsar and Hussein Ibish give words to be heeded. Prof. Sarsar is a former colleague of mine when I was in New Jersey, a native of East Jerusalem, a Christian Palestinian, a Vice President at the University of Monmouth.

Mr. Ibish was Communications Director for the ADC (American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee), has a PhD from U. Mass and is a Sr Research Fellow at the ATFP (American Task Force on Palestine).

It is an extraordinarily perceptive piece on the need for "progress" on the "Two-State" solution. (Disclosure: I've given up on the Two-State solution long ago, and think the "equal rights" movement is a better route to take). But for all that, these two men clearly make the case for action in a prudent, persistent way. It raises many questions but seeks to clarify the issues.

Read it, ponder it, and pass it on as it contributes significantly to the discussion. The longstanding conflict is a microcosm of US Middle East policy.

I'm planning on going back there next year. Let's go together. jrk

The Long Overdue State of Palestine
Hussein Ibish and Saliba Sarsar
The Huffington Post (Opinion)
July 18, 2011 - 12:00am
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/hussein-ibish-phd/state-of-palestine_b_901442.html

With the independence of the new Republic of South Sudan, the world is again reminded that states are created on the basis of local, regional and international necessity. At least two decades of international action, as well as a long, bitter and bloody conflict produced the independence of the south, a state that has been already welcomed by the international community, the African Union, the United Nations, and has been invited to join the Arab League.

South Sudan is only the latest newly-created state in the international community. In recent decades numerous new countries have come into existence, arising out of the former Soviet Union, the former Yugoslavia, the split between the Czech Republic and Slovakia, the secession of Eritrea from Ethiopia, and so forth. Yet more than 60 years after its existence was envisaged by the UN partition plan for Palestine, more than 40 years after its creation was implied in the UN Security Council resolutions 242 and 338, and almost 20 years since the Oslo Accords led the whole world to expect that Palestine would, soon, enjoy independence, there is still no Palestinian state.

It's hard to overestimate the strategic, political and cultural damage this failure to secure Palestinian independence is having on the Middle East as a region, and, indeed, throughout the globe. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the ongoing occupation that began in 1967 is completely disproportionate to its geographical and demographic size because of the profound emotional, ideological, religious and symbolic investment people throughout the world have made in it. Passions run high far beyond Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories, and it's no exaggeration to describe the conflict and the occupation as a cancer on the body politic of the global community.

The bottom line is this: in the area between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea -- what has been the de facto Israeli state since 1967 -- there are approximately equal numbers, about 6 million of both, of Jewish Israelis and Palestinian Muslims and Christians. One group has a state, citizenship, self-determination and independence. A small group of Palestinians, about 1 million, are citizens of Israel but subject to significant forms of discrimination. But the large majority of Palestinians live in the occupied territories without citizenship or enfranchisement of any kind, self-determination or independence, and are subject to the arbitrary and typically abusive rule of a foreign military. Moreover, they have watched as their land is steadily colonized by Israeli settlements, which are both a violation of international law and a human rights abuse against those living under occupation according to the Fourth Geneva Convention. Nowhere in the world is there any comparable level of separate and unequal as there is under Israeli rule in the occupied Palestinian territories.

David Ben-Gurion, who was Israel's prime minister twice, during 1948-1953 and 1955-1963, respectively, eloquently spoke in 1945 of the Jewish yearning for national validation and self-determination. He stated, "We are a people without a State and, therefore, a people without credentials, without recognition, without representation, without the privileges of a nation, without the means of self-defense, and without any say in our fate." These might easily be the words of a Palestinian leader in 2011.

Two years later, on November 29, 1947, the United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 181, recommending the partition of Palestine into two separate states, one Jewish and one Arab, with the Jerusalem-Bethlehem area to be placed under special international protection, administered by the United Nations. However, the UN Security Council failed to implement Resolution 181, and as soon as the British Mandate was terminated, Jewish leaders declared the establishment of Israel, leading to the intervention by five Arab armies in what was already a raging communal civil war in Palestine. This conflict left Israel in de facto possession of not the 55 percent of mandatory Palestine envisaged in the partition resolution, but 78 percent, which are now generally regarded as the internationally accepted borders of Israel.

Sixty-three years later, and following seven wars, the displacement of over a million Palestinian refugees during the 1948 and 1967 wars (who now number more than four million), two Palestinian intifadas, and countless dead and wounded, Israel remains a nation at war and in fear, and Palestinian national aspirations remain totally unfulfilled. Israeli settlements continue to be built at an alarming pace, with 200 already constructed, and the half-million Jewish Israeli colonists living in them are squeezing Palestinians into ever smaller areas of the West Bank and Jerusalem, and denying them access to water and other resources.

Peace efforts such as the Oslo accords (1993); Wye River accord (1998); Camp David meeting (2000); Taba negotiations between Palestinian and Israeli delegations (2001); George Mitchell's proposal (2001); George Tenet's plan (2001); United Nations Resolution 1397, which affirmed a vision of a region where Palestine and Israel would live side by side within secure and recognized borders (2002); the Arab Peace Initiative adopted unanimously twice by the Arab League (2002); and the "roadmap" for peace adopted by the Quartet (2003); have all been creditable efforts to develop peace, but none have succeeded and thus far the agony and tragedy have simply continued.

Years of conflict and insecurity, narratives of exclusion and pain, and incompatible visions of the future, let alone understandings of the past, have created a serious disconnect between Israelis and Palestinians. Each national community is caught up in its own tendentious and exclusive narratives: Israel using the past and the present to create the future; the Palestinians using the present to recreate the past in service of the future. Both are laboring under serious illusions.

Unfortunately, while US policy has emphasized that a two-state solution is imperative for American national interests, because of the "special relationship" between the two countries, in practice it remains steadfastly in Israel's corner, vetoing 26 UN Security Council draft resolutions on Palestine since July 1973. Domestic political considerations and a powerful American popular and elite consensus in support of Israel make pressuring that country in the normal diplomatic manner very difficult for an American president. Palestinians have hoped to be able to use the "special relationship" to help mollify Israeli concerns and reassure them that because of American participation, they are not taking any inordinate risks in entering into a peace agreement with the Palestinians. So far, this strategy, while theoretically promising, has yet to demonstrate much efficacy.

According to almost all opinion polls, most Palestinians and Israelis are in favor of a negotiated two-state solution, based on the 1967 borders, with agreed upon land swaps. Unfortunately, similarly large majorities do not believe it will happen and do not trust the other side's intentions. Unless President Barack Obama is able to persuade Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu to negotiate on the aforementioned parameters, then the Palestinians will be facing many more checkpoints and a stonewall of delay while the Israelis continue to seize more Palestinian land in East Jerusalem and the West Bank.

Unfortunately, many Palestinians and Israelis believe that Netanyahu has no interest in pursuing a negotiated solution along the lines that Palestinians would deem acceptable. And, even more unfortunately, his unenthusiastic approach to the peace process and insistent emphasis on security above all, including peace, has proven extremely popular in Israel and he leads an unlikely but extraordinarily stable coalition government. In other words, his default position of saying "no" to everything is serving his political interests, leaving him with few incentives to be more forthcoming.

However, as numerous Israelis with impeccable national security credentials, including some very strongly rooted in the political right, have been publicly stating in recent months, it is essential to Israel's national interest to help secure the creation of a viable, democratic and peaceful State of Palestine. While the Israeli occupation resulted from conditions of the 1960s or even earlier, the time for its ending has come. An independent, contiguous, and secure Palestine (democratic, pluralistic, non-militarized, and neutral) living in peace alongside Israel is, as an apparent consensus of Israeli national security experts appear to recognize, the only way to secure Israel's long-term safety and stability. The occupation is untenable, dangerous and, ultimately, self-destructive.

The Arab states, as well as the United States and Israel, strongly require the creation of a Palestinian state for their fundamental national interests. For too long the Palestinian question has been a volatile, destabilizing variable in regional politics, the source of conflict and tension, and a powerful tool in the hands of extremists of many different varieties. This understanding was most importantly expressed through the Arab Peace Initiative, but has also been repeatedly emphasized by Arab leaders across the region. King Abdullah II of Jordan, in his memoir, Our Last Best Chance: The Pursuit of Peace in a Time of Peril, expressed "a sense of urgency, a conviction that the window for peace between Israel and the Palestinians is closing." We agree with him when he states, "Both sides have a moral responsibility to strive for peace... the alternative is more conflict and violence."

Every moment that is lost only benefits the proponents of extremism on all sides. Albeit a minority, they will continue to monopolize the political narrative and dictate the facts on the ground in the absence of peace. The moderates will lose heart and fade away in the smoke of violence and hate and the fog of deception.

Enlightened leadership not only leads and serves but finds like-minded followers as well, leaders in their own right, who would be eager to sustain positive change for the common good of both Palestinians and Israelis. It not only responds to constituencies, it creates them. The need for allies for peace and statehood is equally important as the need for such a consensus locally, regionally, and internationally.

What Ben Gurion envisioned for his people in 1945, all Palestinians have sought for decades. It is high time that the United States and the rest of the international community stood by them, not just rhetorically or in terms of development aid, but with practical, effective diplomatic efforts that ensure that the occupation will end, and that a Palestinian state alongside Israel will be created, recognized by the major powers of the world, and welcomed as a member state of the United Nations. Without a doubt this will require Israeli acquiescence as well, which means that negotiations are unavoidable and indispensable.

But the international community has an important role to play in laying the groundwork for such an agreement, making it crystal clear that it will accept no other outcome, applying both negative and positive pressure on both sides to make it happen, and doing everything possible to avoid any other outcome. Simply leaving it up to the parties, which are defined by the most extreme degree of power asymmetry imaginable, is not a viable option. International engagement, led by but not exclusive to the United States, is more indispensable now than ever. Especially given the role the international community played in the creation of Israel, it has a right and a responsibility to play a similar role in the creation of Palestine.

This is a delicate process, and we are not proposing an implausible and impracticable "imposition" of a solution on the parties by an international community that is unwilling and probably unable to take such steps. Nor are we suggesting that the Palestinian demand for full UN membership in September is likely to prove successful. Clearly a failed confrontation with the United States at the UN Security Council over the issue of statehood is not in anybody's interest, let alone the Palestinians. However, a greater role for the international community in resolving this exceptionally damaging and destabilizing ongoing conflict is essential. Palestinians can and should receive a major upgrade of their observer mission status from the General Assembly, and should be recognized on a bilateral basis by every state that is serious about Israeli-Palestinian peace.

There is much the international community can do to promote a two-state solution, particularly by clarifying its unshakable commitment to this outcome and its categorical refusal to accept any alternative. There is no longer any excuse for postponing or delaying such measures. They do not undermine Israeli-Palestinian negotiations; they support them insofar as they make the only reasonable, workable outcome far more likely and demonstrate that the world expects and will help the parties arrive at a two-state solution in the near future. The international community has made its commitment to Israel very clear since 1948. It must now move quickly to make its commitment to Palestine alongside Israel equally clear, especially to the Palestinians and the Israelis.

Aiming at "Equal Rights" (NOT "Statehood")

2011-07-17T14:54:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,

This article argues that a new generation of activists are rejecting the "old" leadership of warring factions (Fatah and HAMAS), and will be pressing (nonviolently) for "equal rights" in the land of Isr/Pal.

It looks to me like Rachel Shabi is on to the essence of this "new movement" that sees striving for Palestinian "statehood" as outdated and irrelevant to "facts on the ground". Civil rights for Palestinians in the land of Israelis and Palestinians sounds more like Martin Luther King Jr and the civil rights movement in the US.

Our "friend" Sami Awad (Holy Land Trust) is quoted at the bottom of the article. Please at least scan this piece. Your faithful servant, JRK

Palestine Lost
Rachel Shabi
Foreign Policy (Opinion)
July 13, 2011 - 12:00am
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/07/13/palestine_lost

Promises were made, and it looks like they'll be broken.

U.S. President Barack Obama said he believed a Palestinian state could be created by September 2011. Speaking to the U.N. General Assembly in September 2010, he laid down a challenge to formulate an agreement that would make it a reality.

That same deadline was set by Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad for his state-building plan, which was intended to create the institutions for a viable Palestinian state.

But U.S.-brokered negotiations have been a miserable failure, and September is now fast approaching. Palestinian leaders have declared their intention to push for recognition in the U.N. General Assembly, where they can expect overwhelming support. The United States is expected to block the move in the Security Council -- and, of course, Israel will not alter its policies in the West Bank and Gaza Strip because of a U.N. resolution.

Now, with the Palestinian dream of statehood stymied at every turn, a new generation of activists are adopting fresh tactics to win their rights.

"September is a moment of truth for us," says Diana Alzeer, a 23-year-old social activist from Ramallah who cites the revolution in Egypt as inspiration. "We see that a dictatorship of over 30 years was gone in two weeks. So why not for Palestinians?"

Alzeer is part of a network of global Palestinian activists that form the "March15" movement -- named for the date when thousands took to the streets of Gaza, the West Bank and Jersualem to call for Fatah and Hamas, the two dominant Palestinian parties, to end their bitter division. But the movement also proves that the Palestinian street is growing disillusioned with its long-dominant political factions. "That's the big difference now," says Alzeer. "We are not led by parties. Most of us don't belong to any."

March15 is a loose network of young, social media-friendly activists organizing globally and injecting new life into the Palestinian popular struggle. Healing political divisions is one step on the path of creating a united, non-violent protest movement, they believe. Another goal on that same path, some activists say, is to resuscitate the PLO's legislative body, the Palestinian National Council -- and allow all Palestinians, regardless of geography, to elect representatives. And for some, the idea of pursuing a Palestinian state through asymmetric negotiation with Israel is simply outdated.

"What's the use of state if you can't have the political rights that go with it?" asks Fadi Quran, a 23-year-old coordinator of Palestinian youth groups in Ramallah. "The demands of the new movement that is slowly but surely beginning to surface are freedom, justice and dignity -- that both Palestinians and Israelis should have the same opportunities and the same rights, as equals."

This year also marks the 20-year mark of the start of the peace process between Palestinians and Israelis in Madrid in 1991 and led to the landmark Oslo Accords -- a process that, in all that time, has yielded few results. Those Palestinians who have grown up in the "Oslo years" have grown deeply cynical as the peace process faltered and failed to deliver. And Obama's spectacular climb-down last year over Israel enforcing a freeze on settlement expansion was, for many, the final nail in the coffin of a negotiated solution.

Young Palestinians now see more hope in the democracy movements sweeping the region, and draw parallels in their opposition to corrupt, unrepresentative politics and a stifling lack of opportunity. "This whole generation in the Arab world is more educated and its main goal has been to break away from the older generation and create something new for themselves," Quran says.

This sentiment is borne out in public opinion surveys. Though Palestinian national sentiment is notoriously difficult to measure, the Norwegian research firm FAFO recently found that Palestinians believed corruption had increased significantly over the past three years. What's more, FAFO discovered that support for both Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh have slumped in 2011.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian push for statehood at the United Nations may not get many cheers on the ground. Quran argued that, even if successful, a U.N. statehood seal would be no more than a moral victory. "There will be no full sovereignty, no contiguous land, no Palestinian control over large swathes of the Palestinian population -- nothing that you need to be state," he says. "If there is a huge fuss and a declaration of statehood, a lot of Palestinians will say it is a big joke and that we are sick of people playing with our destiny."

The shift among some protesters, from statehood to equal rights, has also put women center-stage. They are increasingly leading the Friday afternoon marches against the Israeli separation barrier and Jewish settlements in the West Bank. A small group of active Palestinian women focused on such protests say they take regular inquiries from new female activists, inspired by images of young Palestinian women facing down Israeli soldiers. They also explain that they earned their protest stripes during the March 15 demonstrations in Ramallah, when they formed human shields around male activists, taking the blows from security officials who at first attacked, later defended, and finally joined them

"These are guys who would usually never listen to a woman and her opinions but now they are with us, working together," says Lina, a 27-year-old woman from East Jerusalem.

For her, it's all in line with the new goals of the movement. "It is about complete, dynamic change, rather than the same people running the system," she says. "This is not about territory any more, but about rights -- and the same rights for women."

Already, this movement has altered the format of Palestinian protest movements. On May 15, March15 was involved with coordinating border protests of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon and Syria, linking those to simultaneous demonstrations in the West Bank and Gaza. The striking display of unified protest marked Nakba Day, the Palestinian commemoration of their displacement in the war that created Israel.

At least 14 people were killed and hundreds injured as Israeli forces opened fire on these mass protests - Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas declared a three-day mourning period for those killed. But the March15 movement had made its mark. As Nazareth-based journalist Jonathan Cook pointed out in an article for The National, "the scenes of Palestinian defiance on Israel's borders will fuel the imaginations of Palestinians everywhere."

Quran argues that the unity of the protest movement is an antidote to the current politics of division. "We thought it would take longer to convince Palestinian youth from different locations around the world to get together," he says. "But all we had to do was get in touch with them."

Activists predict more change is coming. "Non-violent protest won't be political activities or just about the [Israeli separation] wall or settlements," says Sami Awad, director of the Holy Land trust, a Bethlehem-based, non-profit organisation that works on Palestinian community building. "We want to expose the inequalities that Palestinians face -- from water distribution to education to movement and freedom of worship."

This is not about giving up on Palestinian statehood entirely, but rather a strategic decision to put it on pause. "Until the equal rights of Palestinians are recognised, we will not be able to find a political solution," says Awad. "For now, that can wait."

Haaretz Editorial

2011-07-10T09:18:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,

The editorial speaks for "progressive" Israelis who want a change from the direction being given by the present Likud leadership.

Likud continues to demonize Palestinians, denying their legitimate aspirations for national identity.

Many of us sense the time for a "Two-State" solution has long past. But some keep beating a "Dead Horse". (As in this editorial)

Is resurrection possible after death? For people of hope, life after death is possible. But . . . it means a change; life-change. Attitude change. A new mind-set.

Perhaps the tide is changing. Add your voice to the need for meeting "The Other" at least half way. JRK

Israel should learn the lessons of Sudan

The UN proved its ability to resolve bloody conflicts with South Sudanese independence. Sudan's partition plan, which was passed by a democratic referendum and supported by the international community, proved that a peaceful solution can be found, even for the most bitter conflicts.
Haaretz Editorial

The city of Juba was joyous yesterday. Thousands of inhabitants of the world's 193rd country, the Republic of South Sudan, celebrated its independence in the presence of the United Nations secretary general and numerous other leaders - including its former enemy, the president of North Sudan, Omar al-Bashir. They cheered at the sound of the newest national anthem on Earth and the unfurling of the flag of the world's youngest nation.

South Sudan's independence was bought by great bloodshed. After 50 years of civil wars, which cost the lives of some two million Sudanese, the time came to partition the north and the south. Yesterday's celebrations could not hide the serious problems of the new country: One out of seven babies will not reach its fifth birthday, and between one and four million South Sudanese might be deported from the north. How will oil profits be divided between the north and the south? What will South Sudan, one of the poorest and most corrupt regions in the world, do with the money - will it continue to spend it on its army or devote it to solving its social problems? How will the debts of the two countries - a total of $38 billion - be divided? And how will the south find an outlet to the sea?

But yesterday was a time for worldwide celebration: The United Nations proved its ability, in a rare instance, to resolve bloody conflicts. Sudan's partition plan, which was passed by a democratic referendum and supported by the international community, proved that a peaceful solution can be found, even for the most bitter conflicts. The involvement of the United Nations was the critical factor in resolving the conflict.

Israel should learn the lessons of Sudan. Not only should it join the expected general recognition of the new country; it should realize that the division into two countries backed by the international community is the only way to solve a bloody conflict like the one between the Israelis and the Palestinians. While Israel is fighting a harsh and needless battle against UN recognition of a Palestinian state, it should look to Sudan and draw the conclusion that a diplomatic plan that wins the support of the United Nations and most of the world, could be the best plan for Israel, too. After South Sudan became the 193rd country, it may be hoped that if Palestine becomes the 194th, it will be with the support of its neighbor, Israel.

Palestinians Redefine their National Struggle

2011-07-05T16:46:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,
It's about nonviolent, active resistance to the occupation. Very unsettling (if you'll pardon the pun) to the Israelis, who don't know what to do when confronted by lots of people with no weapons except their bodies and a Cause: for enfranchisement.

Palestinians seek to redefine national struggle

Raymond G. Helmick, Nazir Khaja
Arab News (Opinion)
June 26, 2011 - 12:00am
http://arabnews.com/opinion/columns/article462116.ece

Young Palestinians, fascinated by the Arab Spring, have demonstrated recently in ways that ignore the contest of parties within their own community and seek simply freedom, justice, dignity and equality. Their movement is still small, only a couple of hundred demonstrators, determinedly nonviolent in their demand, gathered, but of course they were immediately flooded with tear gas and worse by the Israelis, who understand how vital it is for them to provoke nonviolent protesters into throwing that first stone.

The movement deserves to gain wings, and is the epitome of innocence and fresh hope, worthy of the dynamic that is flowing throughout the Arab world. Yet the most important development in their world is the pact between Fatah and Hamas (brokered by the Egyptians). That is pre-condition to any effective move by Palestinians. It is endangered now by the difficulty of agreeing on the makeup of the government of technocrats to which both have already subscribed. This comes upon the plate of both Khaled Meshaal and Mahmoud Abbas. Hamas refuses to accept continuation of Salam Fayyad as prime minister.

That is entirely understandable, given his history, of having replaced, by appointment, a duly elected government, and even having imprisoned elected Hamas representatives. There was massive Israeli and American pressure behind that. He is, however, the technocrat, not a man of either party, and a highly-competent technocrat, someone whose talents are genuinely important. To have him dumped and disgraced would be a humiliation to Abbas, and it is a basic rule in any such agreement as that between Fatah and Hamas that neither side should be humiliated. Accepting him as prime minister would equally be humiliation for Hamas, and unacceptable. The compromise could well be that someone else — a nonparty technocrat — be made prime minister. The Palestinians have plenty of highly educated and talented people on hand, and Fayyad could be made something like minister of development, with authority to do exactly as he has been doing in the creation of functioning institutions.

The Israelis will in fact fight tooth and nail, and successfully, to avert the single unitary state. One need have no sympathy whatever for the ambition to make Israel the “Jewish state” in the sense the Israeli far-right gives it, a state that is only for Jews and yields no equality to its non-Jewish citizens. But one can remain committed to an Israel that is the guarantee of the safety of Jews from the perils that have confronted them for millennia.

Perhaps the unitary state would be that guarantee, since Muslims were for centuries the haven for Jews from the atrocities committed against them by the Christian world, but there is a lot of fear and hatred to be overcome as a result of the last century’s behavior toward Palestinians, and we should expect that fear, on the part of a panicked Israeli public, would win. It may well be that a confederated state could result when those fears and the hatred have been stilled but that could only be later.

What could work now? It is time to recognize that none of the external parties — US, the Arabs, the rest of the Quartet — will do anything to help the Palestinians. That happens to mean, also, that they will do nothing to hold the Israelis back from a course that can only do them grievous harm. Israelis, if they continue on this course, will lose in a spectacular way, but that will be too late for the Palestinians. Many of us had high hopes from Barack Obama, but he has been vanquished once again by Netanyahu when he spoke to the joint houses of the American Congress, which acted as if it were his wholly owned subsidiary. If Obama moves again, it will only be after an election. The Palestinians are on their own.

No Palestinian government can have any legitimacy if it is not a movement of resistance to the occupation. The only effective resistance will be a full mobilization of the people to nonviolence, to a total noncooperation with any aspect of the occupation. No prison works without some degree of cooperation between prisoners and jailers, and that cooperation can be denied. Some say that the Fatah and Hamas leaders, looking instead to the UN for help, are afraid that a genuine popular movement of this sort would detract from their own authority.

That would be so only if they do not lead it. Any and all violence on the part of Palestinians is poison, and their own undoing. The pact between Hamas and Fatah is indispensable if any such campaign were to be mounted, but it would be successful. The people would suffer from a violent Israeli response to it — the Israeli response would be first and foremost an effort to provoke the Palestinians to go over to violence, as they did so successfully at the start of the Second Intifada, and it would take strong organization for the people to resist that provocation tactic — but they would win. Israelis, faced with that kind of nonviolent utter disruption of their lives would find themselves in the position of a Hosni Mubarak, unable to cope with it and forced to back down. They would still refuse to enter the unitary state, but their only alternative response would be to concede a real Palestinian state — granted that, once that existed and the traumas had been overcome, the two states might very civilly come to a confederation. We can respond with delight that young Palestinians have caught the essence of the Arab Spring, the commitment to freedom, justice, dignity and equality. Now it needs some structure to connect it with the realities that face them.

Hussein Ibish on Nonviolent Tactics

2011-07-02T14:35:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,

Hussein Ibish has a strong point in how Palestinians strategize for "liberation".

The IDF (Israeli Defense Force) has no strategy against unarmed protesters, except to physically harm them.

They keep equating nonviolent protesters with "violence". In truth, nonviolent protesters expose the violent center of the occupation forces.

Read on. JRK

Nonviolence, a Palestinian path to liberation

Hussein Ibish
NOW Lebanon (Opinion)
June 28, 2011 - 12:00am
http://www.nowlebanon.com/NewsArticleDetails.aspx?ID=286401

At the end of last week in the West Bank village of Bilin, an important principle was decisively demonstrated: Palestinian nonviolence can achieve real results in resisting the Israeli occupation.

After almost a decade, Bilin protests against Israel’s gruesome West Bank separation barrier has finally produced a substantial rerouting of the wall, giving villagers access to a significant portion of their confiscated land. The greater part remains seized or inaccessible, and protesters vow that their struggle is far from over.

There are several important lessons to be learned from this significant achievement.

First, the protests have been successful precisely because they are, and only to the extent that they have been, nonviolent. Israel and its supporters have no answer to Palestinian nonviolent resistance to an abusive occupation, except the accusation that it is, in fact, violent. While sometimes the protests have degenerated into stone-throwing by youths, and have often been met by force by the Israeli occupation forces, in fact the demonstrations have been overwhelmingly nonviolent. This is what has given them their power.

To extend and replicate this effective nonviolent approach, serious discipline will have to be developed and maintained to ensure it continues even in the face of military repression. Nonviolence is one of the most powerful weapons of resistance against occupation.

Second, the protests are all the more powerful when their objections are firmly rooted in international, and even where possible Israeli, law. In 2004 the International Court of Justice issued an advisory opinion that the route of Israel’s separation barrier, which is not along its own border but cuts deeply into occupied territory, was unlawful and a human rights violation. In 2007, the Israeli Supreme Court ruled that the portion of the barrier in Bilin had to be rerouted.

Both of these important legal findings were consequences of the nonviolent confrontation with what is plainly unlawful human rights abuse against ordinary Palestinian villagers under occupation. Nonviolent protests prick the conscience of the world, and of Israelis. They also disarm the logic of the occupation and the settlements as forward defenses in an existential struggle by Israel, revealing them to be in their essence, instead, a system of discipline and control by a foreign army over millions of subjugated people.

Third, nonviolent protests are not an end in themselves, but have to be part of a broader Palestinian national strategy. The fact that some significant Palestinian national leaders, especially Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, have supported and participated in the protests demonstrates a convergence between grassroots, bottom-up organization addressing local issues and top-down leadership that deals with national ones.

Fayyad’s rousing speech at last Friday’s protest—in which he spoke of the slow but inevitable victory of nonviolence, how it is a crucial tool in ending the occupation, and that when Palestinians confront occupation with nonviolence “the whole world is with us”—demonstrates the potential for such a convergence. Combined with state-building, boycotts carefully targeted against the occupation but not Israel per se, and well-calculated diplomacy, Palestinian nonviolence should be an essential part of a successful national liberation strategy.

Contrast this powerful and genuine grassroots approach with the transparent and cynical effort by the Syrian government to encourage protests on June 5 at the armistice lines between Syria and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. This area is one of the most tightly controlled border regions in the world, and has been under virtual lockdown by the Syrian military for decades. With the Assad regime in deep trouble at home, suddenly protesters were welcome to come and go freely, and apparently encouraged to confront Israeli troops.

At least 20 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces, an overreaction and excessive use of force that typifies Israel’s approach to what it regards as its frontiers, whether those approaching it are armed or not. The death toll was predictable, predicted and entirely avoidable. Indeed, all Lebanese factions agreed a repetition of the violence along the Lebanon-Israel border on May 15 was unacceptable, and that area, by contrast, remained entirely calm on June 5.

If the goal of the June 5 Golan Heights protests was to embarrass Israel or touch the conscience of Israelis and the whole world, it did not succeed for many reasons: above all the unavoidable perception that the Syrian government was hoping to distract attention from its own killing of nonviolent protesters in cities throughout Syria. In fact, unlike the West Bank protests, the Golan protests achieved nothing.

This was only underscored in the following days by the killing of 20 Palestinians at the Yarmouk refugee camp near Damascus by a radical Palestinian faction aligned with the Syrian regime.

When the dust settled in early June, dozens of Palestinians lay dead while Israel and Syria were stripped of the ability to point fingers at each other for shooting unarmed people. And between these two events, the Syrian regime lost the ability to play the “Palestinian card” in its struggle to hold onto power.

While cynical exploitation by desperate Arab dictatorships is the last thing the Palestinian cause needs, nonviolent protests such as those at Bilin have proven their efficacy. They offer not only the best way of resisting the occupation but also, as the part of a broader strategy, a real path to national liberation.

The Urgency of Reconciliation

2011-07-01T17:14:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,

Salim Munayer and MUSALAHA, are working for reconcilation between Palestinian-Israelis (20%), Israelis and Palestinians. It isn't just whose working for "peace and security" outside the bounds (undefined as they are), it's what's happening among the inhabitants of the land, which includes 20 - 25% of the population that is Palestinian Israeli.

The stakes are high, expectations are low, convictions/conflicts seem cemented into place.

The hard-pack allows no seeds of peace to be planted and grow to fruition.

We cannot stop our praying for change; change for better relationships; especially inside the country of Israel/Palestine. JRK

The Urgency of Reconciliation

As Israeli and Palestinian believers, we usually focus on our theological differences, but we are unaware of the greater political and societal differences. Recently, I was speaking with one of my colleagues from the Hebrew University, a professor who has done a lot of work on bringing Israelis and Palestinians together. We were discussing the different challenges that these sort of inter-group meetings face, and the lack of hope that people have in the prospect of reconciliation. This led us to talk about the new report by Sammy Smooha, a professor of Sociology at Haifa University, and one of Israel’s preeminent scholars of Israeli-Palestinian relations, especially within the State of Israel. He recently published a report through the United States Institute of Peace, called Arab-Jewish Relations in Israel, Alienation and Rapprochement. It is an informed look at the shift in attitudes over the past few decades, as well as the current situation, and suggests a number of policy changes that should be made to help reconciliation as we go forward.

Smooha first points out that Israeli society is fragmented on a number of different levels. He writes, “Israel is a deeply divided society. The division between Arab and Jewish citizens is reflected in institutions; culture; national identity; socioeconomic status; and stances on the character of the state, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and other fundamental issues. Furthermore, Palestinian-Israelis, [R]eject Zionism, the de facto state ideology of Israel. They see Zionism, the Jewish movement of national liberation, as colonialist and racist, and they denigrate the Jews’ fundamental Zionist collective identity. The Jews, meanwhile, do not see themselves as colonial settlers but rather as the genuine proprietors of the Land of Israel, from which they were historically exiled and to which they rightfully returned to find alien Arabs in possession . . . Both sides reject the most cherished values of the other.

This division is important, because the Palestinians in Israel make up a very significant minority; one in six Israeli citizens are Arab, and they make up around 17 per cent of the total population (excluding the Palestinian Territories). Smooha explains that there are two different theories on the Arab-Jewish relations within Israel, mutual alienation and mutual rapprochement. The mutual alienation theory states that the two communities are on a violent collision course, while the mutual rapprochement theory claims that they are in the process of adjusting to each other. He then looks at the period from 1996 to 2010 and discusses some of the developments that took place, in light of these two theories. “By either account,” he writes, “any account in fact, this was a lost decade for Arab-Jewish coexistence. The situation has worsened and bodes badly for the future of their relations."

For example, Smooha discusses the collapse of the Oslo accords and the beginning of the Second Intifada, as well as the October Events in 2000, when Israeli police killed thirteen Palestinian-Israelis in protests that took place across the country. Smooha also looks at the steep rise in popularity of right wing political parties such as Yisrael Betenu, and the proposed measures to require loyalty oaths, and to criminalize participation in Nakba Day memorial ceremonies. Although these measures were not passed, they affected Arab-Jewish relations within Israel and indicate the level of animosity between the two communities. Among Palestinian-Israelis, the voting rate has dropped from 75 per cent in 1999 to 53 per cent in 2009, and contains an element of boycott that demonstrates a withdrawal from Israeli society. The Palestinian-Israelis that do vote have increasingly supported Arab parties that advocate a bi-national state that would no longer be Jewish. Smooha also includes the results of his survey on attitudes towards reconciliation, and they do not paint a rosy picture. 43 per cent of Palestinian Israelis are not ready to have a Jewish neighbor, and 50 per cent of Jewish Israelis are not ready to have an Arab neighbor. All of these trends represent a growing hostility between these two communities.

For Smooha, real progress will only be made when a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is found, and when Palestinian-Israelis are integrated into mainstream Israeli society. Unfortunately, no progress was made on either of these fronts in the past decade. In spite of this lack of progress, however, Smooha is optimistic. He sides with the mutual rapprochement theory, and believes that we can still reach coexistence and reconciliation, but only if we are willing to work for it. If nothing is done to bring about change, the only result will be further alienation, destruction and violence. We cannot afford to “postpone change until peace is concluded,” we must “take steps immediately to improve Arab-Jewish coexistence” if we are to “preclude further deterioration that might impede peace.”

This is encouraging, and serves as an affirmation of Musalaha’s work. But it is also a warning. As believers, we are by no means immune to the destructive traits that mark our respective communities, and all of the factors that have further entrenched the divisions in the past decade have also affected us. We may disagree on how to go about reaching reconciliation, but we do still have hope for an improvement of our relations, and we have our shared faith in the Messiah who calls us to dwell in unity as brothers and sisters. If nothing is done to restore the relationships that have been damaged, there are dark days ahead, and this is why it is crucial that we allow God to use us as an instrument of his peace. We are called to be peacemakers, and stand against division, hatred and violence with love.

Salim J. Munayer

Musalaha Director

A Call to Action to Israelis & Palestinians

2011-06-25T19:17:00.000-07:00

I've long read the Christian Century. Now I'm subscribing. In this week's issue is a fine editorial by Editor John Buchanan.

It's balanced, pleading, practical, sensible (and thus naive), even wistful, as though our hopes and dreams might some day be fulfilled.

BTW, I'm strongly considering taking another PILGRIMAGE to Israel/Palestine, with mostly Presbyterians. Want to hear more?

Give me a holler and I'll send you details. JRK

Editor's Desk
Double duty

Jun 14, 2011 by John M. Buchanan (The Christian Century)

When George Mitchell quietly resigned as special envoy for the Middle East, I was dismayed. I've always thought of him as a man of strong convictions but also as a pragmatist, a practitioner of politics as the art of compromise. Did he find the Israel-Palestine puzzle so intractable that he concluded that his efforts on behalf of the U.S. government were futile?

Richard Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations, observed recently that while Israel continues to be successful economically, it is increasingly isolated internationally; indeed, it is regarded by most of the world as the chief obstacle to Middle East peace (Time, May 2). Although the Middle East is in a particularly difficult time, with Hamas and Hezbollah on Israel's borders, the future of the Jewish state is at stake.

Churches, including my own, have a long relationship with the people of the Middle East and a mission presence nearly a century and a half old. We established schools, colleges and hospitals in the region and have ecclesiastical relationships with indigenous Middle Eastern churches. Our partners on the ground want and need American church support as they work for an end to the military occupation by Israel and for the self-determination of the Palestinian people.

At the same time American churches are partners with the American Jewish community. Many congregations are enriched by healthy and respectful relationships with neighboring synagogues. On a national level Christians and Jews have long been partners in working for peace and justice.

Sometimes the Jewish community sees Christian sympathy for the plight of the people of Palestine and their cause as hostility toward Israel and as insensitivity to the fact that Israel is surrounded by hostile nations and organizations. Criticism of Israel's policies is sometimes regarded as anti-Semitic.

I believe that Christians need to respond to this situation by doing two things: support the cause of a secure and viable Palestinian state that will live peacefully beside a secure and viable Israel and at the same time reach out to the Jewish community and to our Jewish neighbors in friendship and love and shared commitment to the common good.

Time is running out on the dream of a viable Palestinian state even though most people know that such a state is necessary for the sake of the entire region. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu believes that he can scold President Obama and count on unqualified support from American Jewish organizations. Is it too much to hope that U.S. Jewish leaders will publicly or privately tell the prime minister that he must take political risks for the sake of peace? And that continued settlement expansion, for instance, flies in the face of any verbal commitment to peace and a viable Palestinian state?

Is it too much to hope that Hamas will stop insisting that Israel must be destroyed? Nation-states do not ordinarily declare that neighbors have a "right to exist." But neither do nation-states ignore a neighbor whose charter calls for the elimination, presumably violently, of that state. Why can't Hamas simply say: Give us the right to exist as a state and we'll stop trying to eliminate you.

The Israeli prime minister's fragile coalition includes far-right parties that abhor the thought of any accommodation to Palestine's needs and rights. His counterpart, Fatah's Mahmoud Abbas, must deal with Hamas as a partner in government.

Do these challenges make any initiative too simple, too naive to undertake? Or will someone do something to break the impasse and move toward the peace the whole world so desperately needs?

Mark Braverman, Part 2

2011-06-19T11:35:00.000-07:00

Dear Friends,
In my previous post, I posted Mark's Part 1 of his recent visit to S. Africa. Here is part two with a brief intro and Mark's intro comments. Remember, Mark is a Jewish psychologist, advocating for systemic changes to the US/Isr policy toward the native peoples in Palestine.

Here is the second part of Mark Braverman's effort to apply the S. African experience to the "Kairos" moment in Isr/Pal relationships. It is lengthy, relevant and applicable to the situation in I/P right now.

Here is Mark's introduction to Part 2: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent appearance before a joint session of the U.S. Congress and the shameful behavior of the members of Congress in rising to their feet 29 times to applaud his radical, intransigent positions should shatter any remaining illusions that peace will come through negotiations under current conditions. Politics has failed to bring about a just peace in Israel-Palestine. In fact, the political/diplomatic process, based on false assumptions (Israel will accept a contiguous, sovereign Palestinian state on its borders; the U.S. is an honest broker to the negotiation process) is itself actively advancing the building of Israeli Apartheid...Our situation today is strikingly similar to that faced by a group of South African pastors and theologians confronting the intransigence of the South African government in ending Apartheid. In 1985, they sat down to compose a historic, prophetic document. It had been a long journey to reach that point -- the result of a struggle of the churches in South Africa to come to terms with their silence and their sometimes active complicity with the system that had poisoned and brutalized their society. By 1985 the church had finally arrived at a place from which there was no escape, no compromise, and no way back....

Part 2: A Moment of Truth for the U.S. Church

The first task of a prophetic theology for our times would be an attempt at social analysis or what Jesus would call “reading the signs of the times” (Mt 16:3) or “interpreting this Kairos” (Lk 12:56). Kairos is actually a moment of truth, of discernment, of discovery. It is a revelation of the reality we live in, of what is at stake and our responsibility in that moment.

Allan Boesak, “Kairos Consciousness,” 2011

A moment of truth

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s recent appearance before a joint session of the U.S. Congress and the shameful behavior of the members of Congress in rising to their feet 29 times to applaud his radical, intransigent positions should shatter any remaining illusions that peace will come through negotiations under current conditions. Politics has failed to bring about a just peace in Israel-Palestine. In fact, the political/diplomatic process, based on false assumptions (Israel will accept a contiguous, sovereign Palestinian state on its borders; the U.S. is an honest broker to the negotiation process) is itself actively advancing the building of Israeli Apartheid. There is an urgent need to continue to build the international grassroots movement to delegitimize Israeli Apartheid and to exert economic, social and diplomatic pressure on Israel and on the countries supporting its policies, especially the U.S. Historically, the churches have played a significant role in creating political and social change through movements of nonviolent resistance. Examples of this in recent history are the U.S. Civil Rights movement, organized opposition to the Vietnam War, and the movement to end Apartheid in South Africa.

Our situation today is strikingly similar to that faced by a group of South African pastors and theologians confronting the intransigence of the South African government in ending Apartheid. In 1985, they sat down to compose a historic, prophetic document. It had been a long journey to reach that point — the result of a struggle of the churches in South Africa to come to terms with their silence and their sometimes active complicity with the system that had poisoned and brutalized their society. By 1985 the church had finally arrived at a place from which there was no escape, no compromise, and no way back. The authors of the South Africa Kairos document articulate this in their preamble (passages from the document appear in italics):

We as a group of theologians have been trying to understand the theological significance of this moment in our history. It is serious, very serious. For very many Christians in South Africa this is the KAIROS, the moment of grace and opportunity, the favorable time in which God issues a challenge to decisive action… A crisis is a judgment that brings out the best in some people and the worst in others. A crisis is a moment of truth that shows us up for what we really are. There will be no place to hide and no way of pretending to be what we are not in fact. At this moment in South Africa the Church is about to be shown up for what it really is and no cover-up will be possible… It is the KAIROS or moment of truth not only for apartheid but also for the Church.

Like South Africa in the 1980s, suffering under four decades under the Apartheid regime, the situation in the Palestinian territories after over 40 years under military occupation is serious, very serious. For Israel and the entire civilized world, entering the seventh decade of refugee status for the now five million descendants of the Palestinians displaced by the establishment of the State of Israel, there is no longer any place to hide.

The American context

The situation in Palestine has created this moment of truth for the church on a global level, but churches in different geographical regions face differing contexts, necessitating different Kairos agendas. The context for the Palestine Kairos document is military occupation and the implementation of an apartheid system of dispossession, discrimination and control over all aspects of Palestinian civil society. The context for the Southern Africa Kairos is (1) solidarity with Palestinians living under this apartheid system and (2) the need to unify and energize the church in South Africa by taking on the Palestinian cause. The U.S. context is multifaceted and compelling. It includes: (1) U.S. responsibility for financing the building of Israeli Apartheid and for shielding Israel from accountability in the international arena, (2) the American church’s acquiescence with our government’s support of Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians, (3) theological support (along a spectrum of conservative, mainstream and progressive theologies) for a superior Jewish claim to the land and the right to expel and/or exert political dominance over non-Jewish inhabitants, and (4) the American church’s renewal movement — its quest to return to the fundamental principles of Christianity.

“The favorable time” is now. The Palestinian Spring has arrived in the form of the Nakba Day protests, the Fatah-Hamas unity deal in Cairo and the upcoming United Nations vote on Palestinian statehood. These events unfold against the backdrop of the 2005 Palestinian call for Boycott Divestment and Sanctions, the Palestine Kairos document of 2009, the 2011 Kairos Southern Africa endorsement of Kairos Palestine, the recent popular uprisings throughout the Arab world, and the growing awareness throughout the U.S. churches of the need for education and direct action to bring about a peace based on justice. The Palestinian and South African Kairos documents provide examples for the American church of what it means to take a clear stance on the theological unacceptability of any ideology, theology, or legal system that that grants the members of one group dominance over another. The parallel to our situation is the sham of the U.S.-sponsored “peace process” and the myths that support it, such as the picture of an Israel that makes “generous” offers – offers that serve only to further its colonialist aims. The implications of this are as clear and inescapable for the U.S. church as they are for Palestinians living under occupation today and as they were for the South Africans three decades ago. Any theology and course of action (or inaction) that supports the oppression of an illegitimate regime has to be replaced with an alternative theology and course of action.

Activity within the American church in support of the Palestinian cause is not new. It has been going on for decades, at local and denominational levels, through educational programs, peace pilgrimages, connections with Palestinian and Israeli civil society organizations, and most recently through boycott and divestment initiatives. However, apart from the work of local taskforces and denominationally-based groups devoted to the cause of Middle East peace, a coordinated, ecumenical effort by the American church as a whole has been lacking. Churches for Middle East Peace is an ecumenical organization dedicated exclusively to this issue, but there is a growing awareness that CMEP’s cautious agenda, limited to legislative advocacy, falls short of the activism needed to meet this Kairos moment. It is time for the U.S. church to takes its place alongside the Palestinian, Southern African, and nascent European and Asian Kairos movements.

Lessons from 1985: A primer in “Church theology”

Although both the Palestinian and South African documents need to be studied by American Christians, the 1985 South African document, with its focus on church complicity, provides a particularly useful set of guideposts for the U.S. church. To be sure, there are differences in the historical situation and in the particular configuration of the challenges – indeed, South African colleagues tell me that what we are facing now makes their past struggle look like child’s play. But the core issues of complicity and responsibility, and the perfect storm of theology, ideology and civil religion that support the continuation of an oppressive system are startlingly similar.

The heart of the South African document is its analysis of what it calls “Church Theology:” that is, a theology and set of attitudes, opinions and assumptions that are employed by the church to maintain the status quo and to directly and indirectly support immoral government policies. Church theology tries to create the appearance of opposing injustice and oppression. In reality, however, it is devoted to shoring up the very system that perpetrates the evil:

‘Church Theology’ tends to make use of absolute principles like reconciliation and non-violence and applies them indiscriminately and uncritically to all situations. Very little attempt is made to analyze what is actually happening it our society and why it is happening…Closely linked to this is the lack of an adequate understanding of politics and political strategy.

The document identifies three such “church opinions” or assumptions: reconciliation, justice, and non-violence.

Reconciliation

‘Church Theology’ often describes the Christian stance in the following way: “We must be fair. We must listen to both sides of the story. If the two sides can only meet to talk and negotiate they will sort out their differences and misunderstandings, and the conflict will be resolved.

The fallacy here is that ‘Reconciliation’ has been made into an absolute principle. But there are conflicts where one side is a fully armed and violent oppressor while the other side is defenseless and oppressed. To speak of reconciling these two is not only a mistaken application of the Christian idea of reconciliation, it is a total betrayal of all that Christian faith has ever meant.

In our situation in South Africa today it would be totally unchristian to plead for reconciliation and peace before the present injustices have been removed…No reconciliation is possible in South Africa without justice …

This analysis goes to the heart of the problem when applied to the Israel/Palestine conflict. One of the most striking features of the discourse about Israel/Palestine in the United States is the preoccupation with the need for a “balanced” perspective. Here is how this typically plays out: you may not talk about house demolitions, humiliation at checkpoints, restrictions on movement, the death of innocent civilians, targeted assassinations, or any other examples of Palestinian suffering, without presenting what is usually termed the “other side.” The “other side” is the recognition of the suffering of the Israelis, who have endured five wars, terrorist attacks, and the sense that they are surrounded by implacable enemies. (The fact of Israelis’ fear of annihilation is not in dispute. The question of the reality of the threat, however, is relevant. Ira Chernus takes up this issue in his recent piece in The Nation, “The myth of Israeli vulnerability”). You may not talk about the dispossession of the Palestinians to make way for the Jewish state without noting historic Jewish suffering or the displacement of Jews from Arab countries. On its face, this seems fair. But in the current discourse, the demand for “balance” is not about being fair. Rather, it is used to blunt scrutiny of those actions of Israel that are the root cause of the conflict. As the South African document so effectively sets out, appeals here to principles of “reconciliation,” “dialogue” and “balance” serve not to advance but to obscure the issue of justice. The example of South Africa clearly demonstrates that it is only when the structures of inequality and discrimination have been removed that activities devoted to reconciliation between the parties can be undertaken.

Justice

The very serious theological question is: What kind of justice? An examination of Church statements and pronouncements gives the distinct impression that the justice that is envisaged is the justice of reform, that is to say, a justice that is determined by the oppressor, by the white minority and that is offered to the people as a kind of concession. It does not appear to be the more radical justice that comes from below and is determined by the people of South Africa.

There have been reforms and, no doubt, there will be further reforms in the near future. And it may well be that the Church’s appeal to the consciences of whites has contributed marginally to the introduction of some of these reforms. But can such reforms ever be regarded as real change, as the introduction of a true and lasting justice.

True justice, God’s justice, demands a radical change of structures.

Reform was a major issue for the anti-Apartheid struggle. The offers of reform by the Pretoria government, coming too little and too late, mirrored for the authors of Kairos South Africa the attempts of some of the churches to enact superficial changes that did not address the underlying racial inequalities built into church practice and by which the churches continued to support racist government policies. In similar fashion, “progressive” thinkers among Jews disturbed by Israel’s behavior attempt to find ways to remove or remediate the most egregious and blatant aspects of Israeli policy. These efforts, however, do not address the root cause of the abuses, which arise inevitably from the attempt of Israel to maintain a Jewish majority and to continue Jewish rule over a diverse population. In similar fashion, church bodies attempt to find ways to “balance” or soften the prophetic witness to Palestinian suffering in order to deflect or avoid opposition by Jewish groups and groups within the churches who brand any criticism of Israel as anti-Semitism.

Non-Violence

The problem for the Church here is the way the word violence is being used in the propaganda of the State. The State and the media have chosen to call violence what some people do in the townships as they struggle for their liberation i.e. throwing stones, burning cars and buildings and sometimes killing collaborators. But this excludes the structural, institutional and unrepentant violence of the State and especially the oppressive and naked violence of the police and the army. These things are not counted as violence… Thus the phrase ‘Violence in the townships’ comes to mean what the young people are doing and not what the police are doing or what apartheid in general is doing to people.

In practice what one calls ‘violence’ and what one calls ‘self-defense’ seems to depend upon which side one is on. To call all physical force ‘violence’ is to try to be neutral and to refuse to make a judgment about who is right and who is wrong. The attempt to remain neutral in this kind of conflict is futile. Neutrality enables the status quo of oppression (and therefore violence) to continue. It is a way of giving tacit support to the oppressor.

The parallels are obvious. Israeli state terrorism is contextualized as self-defense. Palestinian resistance is framed as terrorism. Again, Ira Chernus’ recent piece in The Nation is instructive.

The challenge to the American church

The South African document arose from a context of a church – black and white, theologians, pastors and lay leaders – acknowledging its complicity with a tyrannical regime. The document points out that the Bible is very clear about regimes that violate fundamental principles of justice and equality. “A tyrannical regime,” it states, “has no moral legitimacy. It may be the de facto government and it may even be recognized by other governments and therefore be the de jure or legal government. But if it is a tyrannical regime, it is, from a moral and theological point of view, illegitimate.” Thus the church saw no alternative but to oppose the regime itself as unreformable, and to challenge the “church theology” that supported the illegitimate system.

This is where the U.S. church finds itself as it witnesses Israel’s ongoing dispossession and oppression of the Palestinians. It has become increasingly clear that Israel’s goal is not a sovereign and independent Palestine, but the continued colonization of Palestinian lands, the subjugation of its people, and the blocking of any prospect of return for refugees. Like the South Africans in 1985, we are looking today at an Israeli government that has shown itself to be illegitimate according to fundamental religious and humanitarian principles as well as standards of international law. It is the policies themselves, and the government that implements them, that must become the focus of church activity. In the South African case, an appeal to the governments of the world to employ sanctions against the South African government became an increasingly important component of the anti-Apartheid movement. In our U.S. case, it is particularly clear that besides holding Israel itself accountable, we must confront directly our own government’s key role as a supporter of Israel’s illegal, self-destructive and dangerous policies. As was true in the South Africa case, the stakes are very high. The moral imperative for Christians and for all people committed to peace and to social justice is powerful and increasingly urgent:

A tyrannical regime cannot continue to rule for very long without becoming more and more violent. As the majority of the people begin to demand their rights and to put pressure on the tyrant, so will the tyrant resort more and more to desperate, cruel, gross and ruthless forms of tyranny and repression. The reign of a tyrant always ends up as a reign of terror.

The South Africa Kairos document was the product of decades of a church struggle to claim its prophetic heart. The U.S. church is now engaged in a process to remain faithful to its core principles. The time has come to name the struggle and to take sides. It is the choice between conservative theologies that hew to exceptionalist doctrines that pervert the words of scripture into supporting oppression, land taking, and even genocide, and a movement of renewal and return to core values of universalism, social justice, and human dignity — the building of the Kingdom of God here on earth. It is the choice between following denominational hierarchies and cautious clergy more concerned with maintaining church structures, protecting funding sources and preserving relationships with the American Jewish establishment, and following the example of the early church in taking a prophetic stance against injustice. The challenge to the U.S. church is as clear as that faced by the South African church three decades ago. Contemporary theologians, historians and social critics have observed that the religious exceptionalism that is the legacy of our Puritan past is being enacted in our support of Israel. They point to how the current dominant American metanarrative driving the “war on terror” interlocks with the metanarrative of a democratic Israel defending itself (and us) from the implacable hatred of an enemy who embraces a false religion committed to hatred and destruction. They point out the parallels to the first century, when a visionary and iconoclastic Palestinian Jew challenged the oppressive political order of his time (represented by the Temple in Jerusalem), calling instead for a Kingdom based on compassion and social justice.

The argument is made that the situation is complex, the relationships multifaceted and fraught with history, and that the conflicts between equally justifiable “claims” or “rights” create ambiguities and conflicting courses of action. Kairos –“a moment of truth, of discernment, of discovery” — cuts through these intellectual confusions and moral snares. Status confessionis, as American theologian Robert McAfee Brown has written — a confessional situation — is a time when “the issues are so clear, and the stakes are so high, that the privilege of amiable disagreement must be superseded by clear-cut decisions, and the choice must move from ‘both/and’ to ‘either or.’” The Palestinian document is a cry of pain and a call to action. The South African document holds up a mirror to our complicity and to our responsibility to core principles of faith and humanity. The church is called – along with those from other faith traditions and the peace community who join it in this struggle.

Here we stand.

And here is my response to his blog: Dear Mark, Thank you for this clear assessment and application to the I/P situation.
What is not clearly stated is a ringing call for BDS, boycotts, disinvestments and sanctions. I think that is what you are asking “the American churches” to undertake. It seems that only this action got the attention of the Dutch Reformed leaders of the Apartheid regime. They saw “the handwriting on the wall” (the prophecy of Daniel in the OT), and dismantled the policy.

Unfortunately, these were blacks, coloreds and “whites” from the same “Christian” background. Jews, Christians and Muslims in I/P, though “children of Abraham” (with a common father), have long centuries of animosity, distrust and conflict.

We need more studies on how Abraham acted among the “people of the land” (I have such a study of Genesis 23, for example).

I’m not suggesting BDS is the wrong route to take, I just suggesting that attitudes must slowly evolve, making room for “the other”, if true progress is to be made. JRK

Learning from the South Africans!

2011-06-13T18:33:00.000-07:00

Jewish activist Mark Braverman has been in South Africa, meeting with persons wanting to learn how the S. Africans beat back the Apartheid government some time ago. He has now published the first of two blog entries, sharing what he has learned. Go to www.markbraverman.org and click on his "blog: the Politics of Hope" for the text. Please read his comments on what he has learned.

What happened in South Africa is especially relevant to Dutch Reformed and Presbyterian types, many of whom participated in the "boycotts" that finally got the attention of the "white" (Dutch) establishment who wanted to confine the "coloreds" to "their part of the land" and minimize their political rights.

I'm attaching my comments to his blog entry. His response to my entry follows below.

Please follow this discussion and stay tuned in. JRK

Mark Braverman: Your comment on the post [My visit to South Africa Part 1], has a new reply

Here is your original comment:
Dear Mark: I'm looking forward to Part 2. Hard as it was to attain the breakthrough, the architects of Apartheid and the "colored" churches shared a common (Christian) heritage, and were able to find reconciliation without a lot of bloodshed. Much "grace" and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission helped with the aftermath. Unfortunately, I/P is made up of three religious groups, that are not as "close" as the blacks and whites in S. Africa. OK, well, they are children of Abraham, but many generations ago and a lot of water has passed over the dam. Karen Armstrong's "Compassion" creed is helpful and we have to accent the common humanity we have and the values we hold in common (love for God and neighbor, ala "The Common Word Between Us", etc). Thanks for your efforts to bring the OT (and NT) prophetic vision to bear on our region, dear colleague. John [Kleinheksel]

Here is the reply (apparently from his new friends in S. Africa):
Hi John: Thanks for your reflections on the similarities and differences between South Africa and Israel-Palestine. You are right - Bishop Tutu was able to say to the leader of the most right-wing group "whether you like it or not, you are my brother". (He said this to point out that they are both baptised in the same baptism). What we must pray for is not necessarily a Palestinian Mandela or Gandhi (because there are several), but rather an Israeli De Klerk. (FW de Klerk was the last president of apartheid South Africa). In faith terms, he belongs to a church that is even to the right of the Dutch Reformed church but I know that his faith helped him to some extent. But it was his realisation that things could not go on in the same old way, and that sanctions - even people to people sanctions e.g., sports - would only become worse, that ultimately made him move politically. This is why BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) is so important. It would put the pressure on all Israelis to think creatively about a solution, and we in South Africa believe that it will come, but it will NOT come without pressure from everybody. The extreme right-wing will always be there and their bark will be worse than their bite...BDS will help to move most people into the centre...

Holy Land Trust Involved in Sunday's Protest

2011-06-06T19:58:00.000-07:00

Hello Friend,

This morning I sent you the introductory piece on Sami Awad's Holy Land Trust.

Turns out it was his group that called for "nonviolent action" on Naksa Day (yesterday), presumably at all borders. There were 25 killed at the Syrian border with 350 injured. Israel (and US) are desperate to claim self-defense, but I find no evidence that protesters tried to breach the borders, only to go up to them nonviolently.

Below is the essence of a June 2 article prior to yesterday, detailing how the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) was preparing to deal with "nonviolent" protesters.

You will not be pleased with the description. The latter half of the article tells of Sami's work in mobilizing Palestinians to go up to the borders WITH NO WEAPONS, and nonviolently protest against the occupation, trying to guard "borders" that have not even been declared to be borders of the Jewish state.

Pray for protection of those seeking to nonviolently protest occupation forces, forces that are trying to seal the theft of Palestinian land and rights. JRK

Killing Them Softly?

Arieh O'Sullivan
The Media Line (Opinion)
June 2, 2011 - 12:00am
http://www.themedialine.org/news/news_detail.asp?NewsID=32344

“Here’s what they did,” says the commander of an Israeli reserve combat company deployed in the northern West Bank. “They [military higher-ups] dumped on us thousands of rounds of rubber bullets, cases of stun grenades and tear gas and that’s it. That’s the great Israeli army doctrine on how to cope with this Naksa.”

“God help us if [the Palestinians] start staging a non-violent march our way,” the officer told The Media Line, on condition he not be identified.

If there is anything that generates fear in the Israeli army beyond a surprise attack, it is the prospect of facing unarmed demonstrators. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) was made to fight wars, and is uncomfortable confronting unarmed civilians.

But that’s just what Palestinians are planning for this Sunday. Grassroots activists working through the social media are calling people to come out and stage a mass assault on Israel’s borders to mark Naksa day, which commemorates what they call the “setback” of the 1967 Six Day War and Israel’s seizure of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. . . .

The IDF Spokesman declines all requests to interview officers on non-lethal weapons and declined to allow reporters to examine how the IDF was, or wasn’t, preparing its troops for non-violent protests. While the IDF has trained its forces to flight low intensity conflicts, which are combat situations in a non-battlefield environment, it has been notoriously slow in using “less-than-lethal” weapons and only provides its troops with rudimentary riot-control training.

But, in the Central Command, a senior officer told The Media Line that they had deployed at key sites the “Skunk” and the “Screamer.” The Skunk is a water cannon that sprays protesters with foul-smelling liquid and the Screamer is a high-wattage acoustic weapon that causes human insides to vibrate to the point that the target turns into a quivering, vomiting, diarrheic mess.

“Our tactic is to contain the non-violent demonstrations and disperse them if they erupt and arrest the instigators with the tools we have at our disposal,” says a senior officer.

“We have a few of the Screamers deployed and the Skunks which fire a foul smelling organic sticky spray that is awful and pretty much makes you want to just stop what you’re doing and get away.”

For years, the IDF and security forces around the world have been seeking a politically correct tool that would stop demonstrators without seriously harming them. The IDF likes to point out that there is no silver bullet exists that incapacitates protest-hardened demonstrators.

Some projects on the drawing board include a flashing red light that sends anyone gazing at it into an epileptic fit, or bees that become highly aggressive when sprayed with a pheromone. The army even developed blank round for tanks that brings the idea of a stun grenade to a higher level. None of these have ever been deployed.

The Bethlehem-based Holy Land Trust has been one of the most visible organizations promoting non-violent resistance as a Palestinian weapon. Its founder and executive director Sami Awad acknowledged that Palestinian society has come a long way in shedding the perception that pacifism and non-violence are a sign of weakness in Arab society. Watching the effect of the mass protests of the Arab Spring helped greatly.

Awad says he and his organization were once called traitors and collaborators but that has come full circle and advocacy of non-violence actions has been adopted by both the Fatah and Hamas.

“The Israeli leadership and military see [non-violent resistance] as a nightmare,” Awad told The Media Line. “The Israeli establishment is trying to plant fear in the heart of Israeli society. Just look at the way they presented the marches as an existential threat to Israel.”

Awad worries that non-violent actions will not guarantee that the other side will not use lethal weapons in response. “It’s actually not even a fear, but an expectation,” Awad said.

Palestinian peace activist Hanna Siniora says it took time for the Palestinians to realize this, partly due to what he called the brutal suppression of the Israeli army of the violent second intifada, which broke out in 2000 and saw the large-scale use by Palestinians of suicide bombers and armed attacks.

“Before, Palestinian society wasn’t ready for it, but now the Palestinians are much more aware because of the second intifada and because of its violence ended up doing much more damage than good,” Siniora told the Media Line. “The non-violent demonstrations are bearing fruit. This is a message to the public that it’s the best process.

So I am wondering what REALLY happened yesterday!!!!!! Reports of newly dug trenches have surfaced, marking new lines across which protestors would not be permitted to trespass. And land mines have been set there (admitted by the IDF). Israel seems intent on NOT PERMITTING protesters. It is not permitted to protest. If you protest against our rule, you will be shot, whether you throw stones or not, whether you have guns or not. It makes no difference. We tolerate no dissent. Does this sound like someone in Europe around the time of 1938 - 1945?

What indeed, do you do with nonviolent protesters? JRK

The Nonviolent Way to Go

2011-06-06T11:52:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,

Sami Awad is the son of Bishara Awad, President of Bethlehem Bible College.

The below article appeared in the Huffington Post recently. It articulates the nonviolent approach that is in keeping with Jesus of Nazareth, whom, to follow, is "The Way" to go.

Sami Awad

Executive Director, Holy Land Trust

WWJD? A Non-Violent Conflict Resolution for Palestine

How could a person living under military occupation, experiencing first-hand suffering and humiliation, even think about loving the enemy, let alone urge family, friends and neighbors to do the same? This challenging message came from a young rabbi named Jesus in his "Sermon on the Mount."

Of course, Jesus could have suggested we make peace with our enemies or negotiate peace agreements or peacefully resolve conflict; those statements would have been as shocking to the suffering Jews of that time. Instead, he entreated them to go further: to "love" them. This was the word he chose -- a command to all those who seek to follow him.

I studied history to better understand what life in my homeland was like under Roman occupation. The Jewish people had been displaced and lost their property. Many had been tortured, enslaved and imprisoned. Numerous had died at the hands of their oppressors. Sadly, many Jewish religious and political leaders even compromised and corrupted themselves by their Roman superiors.

In a way, my own history seems to parallel what happened more than 2,000 years ago. Like those hearing Jesus' words for the first time, I too have grown up living under military occupation. I have witnessed suffering and the loss it brings. As a Palestinian, I could share countless stories of brutality and abuse. I could explain how fear and grief can quickly turn into anger and resentment.

However, it may surprise some in the West that I am an Arab who was born into an evangelical Christian family. I expect that my family's "conversion" to Christianity happened thousands of years ago on the day of Pentecost, not through mission work. As a boy growing up in Bethlehem, I went to church every Sunday and to Sunday school every Friday, fully immersed in a faith-based culture no different than a Christian family in Bethlehem, Pa., or Palestine, Texas.

As I was learning Bible stories, my day-to-day reality and experiences were teaching me to become bitter and hateful of Israeli soldiers and all they represented. I knew this was not what my faith, schooling or my family had instructed, but these were the life lessons I was learning.
Everything changed for me in the early 1980s when my uncle returned from the United States to establish the Palestinian Center for the Study of Nonviolence in Bethlehem. Now I found a place to address my resentment and vent my anger. I began participating in many nonviolent activities to protest the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands -- from planting olive trees in threatened areas to participating in children's street festivals with balloons colored like the Palestinian flag. When the Israeli government deported my uncle for his nonviolence efforts, I committed myself to engaging in this important work. I was 16 at the time.

For more than 20 years, I have been studying, practicing and teaching nonviolence both inside and outside of Palestine. I started Holy Land Trust in 1998 to promote the idea that nonviolence can be a path toward peace and a greater humanity in this land we all call Holy. Our organization is made up of Palestinians -- both Christians and Muslims -- who work together to develop awareness campaigns, provide training, organize demonstrations, etc. Our efforts often receive the support of internationals, including a growing number of Israeli Jews.

So while I had grown up knowing about the Sermon on the Mount, living it creates a different meaning and purpose. The first step in loving the enemy is to love and honor myself as a person loved by God, to break free from the fear and hatred within me, and to no longer claim victimization and seek pity as a result of the oppressive forces around me. This takes creating a deep distinction between those who stand before me and their behaviors and recognizing that every human being is created in the image of God. It requires acknowledging that conditions, traditions, experiences, traumas and assumptions can shape who we have become but are not who we truly are and, more importantly, who we can be. It's understanding that our core common identity is in our humanity and not in political, ideological or even religious associations.

As a follower of Jesus, I am compelled to promote a process of healing and liberation for those being oppressed as well as for their oppressors. Loving the enemy means you ultimately eliminate the label of "enemy" and engage in loving action to help them recognize and acknowledge your humanity. This is how to love your enemy, to really love them.

This Sums it Up

2011-05-24T07:20:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,
Uri Avnery has been deferring to his associate Adam Keller lately. What follows is Mr. Keller's assessment of the crucial two-day period when 1) President Obama gave his ME policy speech and 2) the following day when he met for two hours with Prime Minister Netanyahu in the White House (prompting the famous outburst).
Mr. Mersheimer calls the present mess, "Obama's Iron Cage". There seems no way for the President to escape it and stay in "power" in 2012.
It remains to be seen where this whole matter is going and whether there can be any "progress" on negotiations. JRK

Obama, Netanyahu and the 1967 borders

Adam Keller, May 21 2011

President Obama has made his long awaited speech and uttered the magic number which some hoped and other dreaded that he would mention – Nineteen Hundred Sixty Seven. And Prime Minister Netanyahu retorted with an angry outburst and total denunciation and rejection of the 1967 borders. Israel's newspapers all came out with banner headlines proclaiming "Confrontation!" and "Collision Course!". In the evening, Obama and Netahayhu met at the White House and made a rather pale effort to paper over the cracks and present the TV cameras with a friendly, smiling, hand-shaking façade – what today's Wall Street Journal called "The most undiplomatic moments of international diplomacy ever offered for cameras".

From the shallow perspective of 48 hours after the speech, how are we to gauge it? A historical breakthrough? A tawdry, soon forgotten media gimmick? Or something in between?

***

It is already many years since the idea of a Palestinian state has become almost universally accepted in Israel, excluding only a thin layer of extreme-right diehards. Several Israeli Prime Ministers in succession talked of the creation of a Palestinian state as a positive and desirable event, notably including Binyamin Netanyahu who announced his adherence to the idea in the celebrated Bar Ilan Speech, soon after getting to power in 2009. Yet, with virtually everybody agreeing, the State of Palestine did not come into being and with every passing year it became more doubtful that it ever would.

The State of Palestine, as mainstream Israeli politicians conceive of it, lacks two ingredients indispensable for a theoretical state to become a real entity in the real world – namely, space and time. Israeli politicians – even and especially the more right-wing of them – would have been overjoyed to recognize a supposedly independent state embracing the present areas of the Palestinian Authority, a collection of isolated enclaves surrounded on all sides by Israeli settlements and military camps. Others, slightly more generous, were willing to grant the Palestinians a bit more territory, making for some territorial continuity – but still with Israel retaining control of the Jordan Valley, which constitutes at least thirty percent of the West Bank. And controlling the Jordan Valley, Israel could and would control all of Palestine's contact with the outside world, all entry and exit of persons and goods – in effect, a larger replication of the situation of siege which Gaza had been enduring for the past five years, (without even a sea shore which international relief flotillas could try to reach at great risk).

When Palestinians expressed a marked lack of enthusiasm for having a state so delimited and constrained, successive Israeli governments had a ready answer: "Let's talk about it". Negotiations, an ongoing Peace Process with glittering photo opportunities and handshakes, were good for Israel's international image, deflecting pressures and distracting attention from unsavory brutality and the ongoing creation of settlement accomplished facts on the ground. Reaching an agreement, not to mention its actual implementation, were an entirely different issue. Much better to avoid or fritter away any definite timetables and target dates (as was the fate of the late, lamented Road Map for Peace, which set 2005 as the time for a final status agreement between Israelis and Palestinians).

Anyway, the Israeli side increasingly reiterated that talking was in essence theoretical, as in fact there was "no partner" and the time was "not ripe". For example, the negotiations carried out for more than two year by PM Ehud Olmert and his Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni were explicitly aimed at producing a "shelf agreement", which would be duly signed and then placed on a shelf to gather dust until conditions for its implementation "ripened". The reasons for there being no partner and conditions being unripe constantly shifted, PM's s and their aides and PR experts showing considerable ingenuity and creativity: Because Yasser Arafat was an arch terrorist and because his successor Abu Mazen was a powerless "chick without feathers"; because the Palestinians were divided with rival government in Ramallah and Gaza or because they had reached a reconciliation to which one party included terrorists; because the surrounding Arab World was ruled by dictators which did not represent their peoples, or because the Arab World had become unstable and engulfed by popular revolts and demands for democracy.

The demand for Israel to freeze the process of settlement creation on the West Bank, clearly made in Obama's first major Middle East speech in Cairo and placed at center stage in his administration earlier efforts at peace making, actually served Netanyahu as a new ploy to endlessly delay and put off the substantive issues. Instead of talking about where Palestine would have its borders and when Palestine would come into being, there was an endless wrangle over whether settlement construction would be or would not be frozen, for exactly how many months, which exceptions would be tacitly or explicitly tolerated , and whether or not the freeze would apply to East Jerusalem.

It might have been different had Obama proven able and willing to put strong and unequivocal pressure on Netanyahu, to freeze settlement construction without further ado. But such was not the case – there were two years of struggles, ups and downs and confrontations and confrontations and sensational headlines in the Israeli media. Obama did apply some pressure, but Netanyahu proved able to apply counter-pressures in the American politics, playing on the Democratic Party shaky position in the 2010 mid-term elections. In the end, Obama gave up the point and ceased further efforts to enforce a settlement freeze. In the international arena, Netanyahu was saddled with responsibility for the collapse of the talks, but evidently considered this an acceptable price. Obama's less than glorious record in implementing what he proclaimed at Cairo two years ago should certainly be taken into account in assessing what he announced at Washington two days ago.

It was while Obama unsuccessfully grappled with settlement construction that Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad – probably the least charismatic leader in Palestinian history – conceived of a way to break out of the futile game of endless negotiations and negotiations about negotiations. In effect, Palestinians would take a leaf from Israel's own book and start creating accomplished facts of their own and fill in the blanks left by the recalcitrant Israeli politicians. Whether or not Israel liked it, Palestine would arise at a specified time, September 2011, and within specified borders, the 1967 borders.

Fayyad spoke openly and in detail about his plan – gathering international support for a crucial recognition vote at the UN, while building up state institutions on the ground and (to a limited degree) supporting unarmed protests and demonstrations by Palestinian villagers confronting Israeli soldiers and settlers.

It was a considerable time before Palestinians in general started to take seriously Fayyad's plan, and even longer before Israelis and the rest of the world followed suit. Eventually, however, the Israeli political and military establishment started to take seriously indeed what Defence Minister Barak termed "The Diplomatic Tsunami" awaiting Israel in September.

Nethanyahu has obvious reasons to dislike the idea of the Palestinians going to the UN to ask for recognition of a Palestine in the 1967 borders, rather than going on waiting for Godot. He and his emissaries had been frantically running around European capitals – Berlin, Prague, London, Paris, Rome – trying with mixed success to get governments to oppose the Palestinian drive in the UN. It was to culminate with getting himself invited to make a speech at the US Congress – more of a home ground then virtually any other place in the world – and effectively pose a threat to Obama in the arena of internal US politics, gearing up towards the 2012 Presidential race.

Obama obviously disliked Netanyahu's plalnned expedition to Capitol Hill. But he also had his own reasons for disliking the Palestinian approach to the United Nations. Because the US, under whatever President, is used to controlling world events and using the UN as its subservient tool, and does not take kindly to somebody else trying to usurp that tool. And because a Palestinian statehood resolution in the UN might face Obama with the problematic choice of casting a veto – and finding the US in international isolation – or not vetoing and then facing the fury of Netanyahu's friends on Congress.

Obama already faced that dilemma in February, when the Palestinians presented the Security Council with a resolution condemning settlement construction, and the US emerged battered from having cast its veto, solitary against the unanimous Yes vote of all other fourteen members of the Security Council, including the United States' European allies. That was, in effect, the dress rehearsal for the expected September vote. With the real thing, the stakes would be far higher, the consequences from any US decision might be drastic and far-reaching indeed. All the more so with the Middle East in a state of revolutionary flux whose outcome none can predict with any certainty and with young Palestinians increasingly and effectively taking up the methods of grassroots organizing via Facebook, as they did on Nakba Day a week ago.

Clearly, Obama's interest lay in trying to preempt the Palestinian diplomatic offensive – and also Netanyahu's Washington venture. Hence, a high-profile policy speech on the Middle East, setting up a supposedly attractive alternative for the Palestinians, delivered just ahead of Netahyahu's arrival in the American capital and relying on Obama's strong position in American public opinion following the killing of Bin Laden. All of which meshed quite well with the need to present a clear formulation of the administration's policy towards the revolutionary upsurge in the Arab World, a policy often charged with being incoherent and self-contradictory.

　

***

Given all the above, what is Obama offering the Palestinians in exchange for halting the drive towards their appointment with the UN in September? What inducement can they have for once again taking up, instead, the route of negotiations – a route discredited by eighteen years of bitter experience since Oslo?

Taking the speech at face value, it can be said to include several conspicuous inducements, the most obvious being that magic number – 1967. "The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states".

"Negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt". (A Palestinian border with Jordan means no permanent Israeli rule in the Jordan Valley, an outspoken Netahyahu demand).

"Palestinians should know the territorial outlines of their state".

Also the question of timing is addressed in a very coherent way: "There are those who argue that with all the change and uncertainty in the region, it is simply not possible to move forward now" (Netanyahu is conspicuous among those who so argue). "I disagree. At a time when the people of the Middle East and North Africa are casting off the burdens of the past, the drive for a lasting peace that ends the conflict and resolves all claims is more urgent than ever". " The international community is tired of an endless process that never produces an outcome". "The status quo is unsustainable, and Israel too must act boldly to advance a lasting peace".

With all of that, Palestinians would still have every reason to feel suspicious of Netanyahu. Even were he to officially accept the 1967 borders as the basis for the negotiations, there is every reason to suspect that once "Resumption of the Peace Process" is publicly proclaimed in a new ceremony and photo opportunity, he would find dozens of ways to wriggle out. For example, accept the principle of "mutually agreed swaps" but in practice lay claim to large tracts of fertile West Bank land, complete with underground water sources, and offer in exchange tiny bits of desert land with not a single drop of water. (That is what Ehud Barak, Netanyahu's Defense Minister, did when he was PM himself in 2000 – a major reason for the disastrous collapse of the Camp David Summit.) Or Netanyahu could make use of Obama's numerous references to Israel's security in order to make demands in practice nullifying the sovereignty of Palestine and amounting to de-facto continued occupation.

Netanyahu could have placed the Palestinians on the horns of a difficult dilemma by agreeing to the principle of the 1967 borders, and agreeing to arrive at the negotiating table on this basis. But he chose not to. He chose the very opposite course – declaring outspokenly his complete and utter rejection of the 1967 "indefensible" borders (actually, on the one occasion when it came to a test, Israel defended itself splendidly from within these borders…). A vehement rejection of 1967, made from Jerusalem immediately upon hearing the speech, and reiterated at the White House while being seated at the President's side, and likely to be reiterated once again on Capitol Hill – in effect asking US Senators and Representatives to choose between their President and the Prime Minister of Israel.

It has been argued that accepting the 1967 lines – however insincerely – might cause Netanyahu serious trouble in his ruling coalition, even a rebellion by nationalist hardliners within his own Likud Party. This is likely true, but it is not necessarily all. To the extent that any politician can be said to be acting out of sincere convictions, Binyamin Netanyahu seems to be acting sincerely now. An adherent of Greater Israel, born and bred, he had been ready to dissemble and make tactical moves and seeming concessions. No more, it seems.

So, what next? Given the events of the past two days, the most likely prediction would be: more of the same. Calls by the United States and the international Quartet for a resumption of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations, which would go unheeded, as with Netanyahu's rejection of the 1967 borders there would be no common basis for negotiations – and given his record up to date, Obama would not be able to compel Netanayhu to change his fundamental position. And there would be more intransigent declarations and intransigent actions by the Government of Israel, violent confrontations of all kinds in various times and places (the next relief flotilla to Gaza is due within a month), an increasing international isolation of Israel and an increasing polarization inside Israel. A continued Palestinian drive to build up support in the UN. And finally, the September showdown coming, with no viable alternative offered, and Obama still facing the dilemma he wanted to avoid – to veto or not to veto. And then?

Obama's Isr/Pal Remarks, May 19, 2011

2011-05-20T05:25:00.000-07:00

The President gave a 45 minute address on US Middle East policy at the State Department yesterday, (May 19).

He shifted US policy away from supporting order/stability and on to the side of democratic reform/change, especially in places like Libya, Syria, Egypt and Bahrain.

Then, at the end of his address, he took aim at the Isr/Pal "conflict", setting forth the US position in re Israelis and Palestinians.

He meets with the Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu today, and addresses AIPAC this Sunday, where he will try to stay in the good graces of our Friend.

There are many noteable positions he has taken. Let me number a few:

1) The US is committed to security for Israel and statehood for Palestinians (self-determination, mutual respect)

2) The present state of affairs is a "stalemate" and "unsustainable". (Basically, he said the "occupation" must end, a first for an American President).

3) Key quote: "We believe the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states".

4) Applauding Israeli and Palestinian parents whose could stoop to hate, but are resolved to move beyond hate to resolution of the conflict, reconciliation

Read it for yourself and move on from there.

Text of Obama’s May 19, 2011 references to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict (last part of larger address).

For decades, the conflict between Israelis and Arabs has cast a shadow over the region. For Israelis, it has meant living with the fear that their children could be blown up on a bus or by rockets fired at their homes, as well as the pain of knowing that other children in the region are taught to hate them. For Palestinians, it has meant suffering the humiliation of occupation, and never living in a nation of their own. Moreover, this conflict has come with a larger cost to the Middle East, as it impedes partnerships that could bring greater security and prosperity and empowerment to ordinary people.

For over two years, my administration has worked with the parties and the international community to end this conflict, building on decades of work by previous administrations. Yet expectations have gone unmet. Israeli settlement activity continues. Palestinians have walked away from talks. The world looks at a conflict that has ground on and on and on, and sees nothing but stalemate. Indeed, there are those who argue that with all the change and uncertainty in the region, it is simply not possible tomove forward now.

I disagree. At a time when the people of the Middle East and North Africa are casting off the burdens of the past, the drive for a lasting peace that ends the conflict and resolves all claims is more urgent than ever. That’s certainly true for the two parties involved.

For the Palestinians, efforts to delegitimize Israel will end in failure. Symbolic actions to isolate Israel at the United Nations in September won’t create an independent state. Palestinian leaders will not achieve peace or prosperity if Hamas insists on a path of terror and rejection. And Palestinians will never realize their independence by denying the right of Israel to exist.

As for Israel, our friendship is rooted deeply in a shared history and shared values. Our commitment to Israel’s security is unshakeable. And we will stand against attempts to single it out for criticism in international forums. But precisely because of our friendship, it’s important that we tell the truth: The status quo is unsustainable, and Israel too must act boldly to advance a lasting peace.

The fact is, a growing number of Palestinians live west of the Jordan River. Technology will make it harder for Israel to defend itself. A region undergoing profound change will lead to populism in which millions of people -– not just one or two leaders — must believe peace is possible. The international community is tired of an endless process that never produces an outcome. The dream of a Jewish and democratic state cannot be fulfilled with permanent occupation.

Now, ultimately, it is up to the Israelis and Palestinians to take action. No peace can be imposed upon them — not by the United States; not by anybody else. But endless delay won’t make the problem go away. What America and the international community can do is to state frankly what everyone knows — a lasting peace will involve two states for two peoples: Israel as a Jewish state and the homeland for the Jewish people, and the state of Palestine as the homeland for the Palestinian people, each state enjoying self-determination, mutual recognition, and peace.

So while the core issues of the conflict must be negotiated, the basis of those negotiations is clear: a viable Palestine, a secure Israel. The United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine. We believe the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states.

The Palestinian people must have the right to govern themselves, and reach their full potential, in a sovereign and contiguous state.

As for security, every state has the right to self-defense, and Israel must beable to defend itself -– by itself -– against any threat. Provisions must also be robust enough to prevent a resurgence of terrorism, to stop the infiltration of weapons, and to provide effective border security. The full and phased withdrawal of Israeli military forces should be coordinated with the assumption of Palestinian security responsibility in asovereign, non-militarized state. And the duration of this transition period must be agreed, and the effectiveness of security arrangements must be demonstrated.

These principles provide a foundation for negotiations. Palestinians should know the territorial outlines of their state; Israelis should know that their basicsecurity concerns will be met. I’m aware that these steps alone will not resolve the conflict, because two wrenching and emotional issues will remain: the future of Jerusalem, and the fate of Palestinian refugees. But moving forward now on the basis of territory and security provides a foundation to resolve those two issues in a way that is just and fair, and that respects the rights and aspirations of both Israelis and Palestinians.

Now, let me say this: Recognizing that negotiations need to begin with the issues of territory and security does not mean that it will be easy to come back to the table. In particular, the recent announcement of an agreement between Fatah and Hamas raises profound and legitimate questions for Israel: How can one negotiate with a party that has shown itself unwilling to recognize your right to exist? And in the weeks and months to come, Palestinian leaders will have to provide a credible answer to that question. Meanwhile, the United States, our Quartet partners, and the Arab states will need to continue every effort to get beyond the current impasse.

I recognize how hard this will be. Suspicion and hostility has been passed on for generations, and at times it has hardened. But I’m convinced that the majority of Israelis and Palestinians would rather look to the future than be trapped in the past. We see that spirit in the Israeli father whose son was killed by Hamas, who helped start an organization that brought together Israelis and Palestinians who had lost loved ones. That father said, “I gradually realized that the only hope for progress was to recognize the face of the conflict.” We see it in the actions of a Palestinian who lost three daughters to Israeli shells in Gaza. “I have the right to feel angry,” he said. “So many people wereexpecting me to hate. My answer to them is I shall not hate. Let us hope,” he said, “for tomorrow.”

That is the choice that must be made -– not simply in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but across the entire region -– a choice between hate and hope; between the shackles of the past and the promise of the future. It’s a choice that must be made by leaders and by the people, and it’s a choice that will define the future of a region that served as the cradle of civilization and a crucible of strife. . . .

A Palestinian Speaks to US

2011-05-17T05:10:00.000-07:00

Friend,
This is an op-ed appearing in the NY Times, Tuesday, May 17, 2011, from the President of the Palestinian National Authority, Mahmoud Abbas. JRK

May 16, 2011

The Long Overdue Palestinian State

By MAHMOUD ABBAS

Ramallah, West Bank

SIXTY-THREE years ago, a 13-year-old Palestinian boy was forced to leave his home in the Galilean city of Safed and flee with his family to Syria. He took up shelter in a canvas tent provided to all the arriving refugees. Though he and his family wished for decades to return to their home and homeland, they were denied that most basic of human rights. That child’s story, like that of so many other Palestinians, is mine.

This month, however, as we commemorate another year of our expulsion — which we call the nakba, or catastrophe — the Palestinian people have cause for hope: this September, at the United Nations General Assembly, we will request international recognition of the State of Palestine on the 1967 border and that our state be admitted as a full member of the United Nations.

Many are questioning what value there is to such recognition while the Israeli occupation continues. Others have accused us of imperiling the peace process. We believe, however, that there is tremendous value for all Palestinians — those living in the homeland, in exile and under occupation.

It is important to note that the last time the question of Palestinian statehood took center stage at the General Assembly, the question posed to the international community was whether our homeland should be partitioned into two states. In November 1947, the General Assembly made its recommendation and answered in the affirmative. Shortly thereafter, Zionist forces expelled Palestinian Arabs to ensure a decisive Jewish majority in the future state of Israel, and Arab armies intervened. War and further expulsions ensued. Indeed, it was the descendants of these expelled Palestinians who were shot and wounded by Israeli forces on Sunday as they tried to symbolically exercise their right to return to their families’ homes.

Minutes after the State of Israel was established on May 14, 1948, the United States granted it recognition. Our Palestinian state, however, remains a promise unfulfilled.

Palestine’s admission to the United Nations would pave the way for the internationalization of the conflict as a legal matter, not only a political one. It would also pave the way for us to pursue claims against Israel at the United Nations, human rights treaty bodies and the International Court of Justice.

Our quest for recognition as a state should not be seen as a stunt; too many of our men and women have been lost for us to engage in such political theater. We go to the United Nations now to secure the right to live free in the remaining 22 percent of our historic homeland because we have been negotiating with the State of Israel for 20 years without coming any closer to realizing a state of our own. We cannot wait indefinitely while Israel continues to send more settlers to the occupied West Bank and denies Palestinians access to most of our land and holy places, particularly in Jerusalem. Neither political pressure nor promises of rewards by the United States have stopped Israel’s settlement program.

Negotiations remain our first option, but due to their failure we are now compelled to turn to the international community to assist us in preserving the opportunity for a peaceful and just end to the conflict. Palestinian national unity is a key step in this regard. Contrary to what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel asserts, and can be expected to repeat this week during his visit to Washington, the choice is not between Palestinian unity or peace with Israel; it is between a two-state solution or settlement-colonies.

Despite Israel’s attempt to deny us our long-awaited membership in the community of nations, we have met all prerequisites to statehood listed in the Montevideo Convention, the 1933 treaty that sets out the rights and duties of states. The permanent population of our land is the Palestinian people, whose right to self-determination has been repeatedly recognized by the United Nations, and by the International Court of Justice in 2004. Our territory is recognized as the lands framed by the 1967 border, though it is occupied by Israel.

We have the capacity to enter into relations with other states and have embassies and missions in more than 100 countries. The World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the European Union have indicated that our institutions are developed to the level where we are now prepared for statehood. Only the occupation of our land hinders us from reaching our full national potential; it does not impede United Nations recognition.

The State of Palestine intends to be a peace-loving nation, committed to human rights, democracy, the rule of law and the principles of the United Nations Charter. Once admitted to the United Nations, our state stands ready to negotiate all core issues of the conflict with Israel. A key focus of negotiations will be reaching a just solution for Palestinian refugees based on Resolution 194, which the General Assembly passed in 1948.

Palestine would be negotiating from the position of one United Nations member whose territory is militarily occupied by another, however, and not as a vanquished people ready to accept whatever terms are put in front of us.

We call on all friendly, peace-loving nations to join us in realizing our national aspirations by recognizing the State of Palestine on the 1967 border and by supporting its admission to the United Nations. Only if the international community keeps the promise it made to us six decades ago, and ensures that a just resolution for Palestinian refugees is put into effect, can there be a future of hope and dignity for our people.

Mahmoud Abbas is the chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization and the president of the Palestinian National Authority.

Israel's Future

2011-05-06T09:40:00.001-07:00

Dear Friend,
Yes, 20-25% of Israeli citizens are what are called "Palestinian Israelis". Second class, but living in Israel. They were original inhabitants of the land and were given permission to become citizens of the land. Suspected by Israelis of siding with Palestinians; suspected by Palestinians of siding with Israelis. Not a comfortable existence.

It is not often that the issue is spelled out simply and clearly. But Ahmed Moor is one of those persons.He gives his assessment of what is happening in Israel and where the future is leading. This article appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle a few days ago. Thanks to the Palestinian Center for making it available.

From time to time, the Palestine Center distributes articles it believes will enhance understanding of the Palestinian political reality. The following article by Ahmed Moor was published by the San Francisco Chronicle on 4 May 2011.

"Israel's Future"
By Ahmed Moor

In an April 27 op-ed, Rabbi Doug Kahn accurately quoted me as having written that "ending the occupation doesn't mean anything if it doesn't mean upending the Jewish State itself." He did not take the line out of context, nor did he misrepresent what I intended to say; democracy in Palestine/Israel and the realization of full human and political rights there for Palestinians means the end of Jewish privilege in my birth country.

The conversation around the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is wrapped in a myth: That the Palestinians will one day have a viable state of their own in the West Bank and Gaza. The reality is that there will be no viable Palestinian state, ever. There are three main reasons for that:

First, the process of ethnic cleansing that created Israel and made my grandparents refugees in 1948 has not stopped. Israel continues to ethnically cleanse the West Bank and East Jerusalem of Palestinians to implant Jews in their place. There are now more than 500,000 Jewish colonists living in the midst of 3.5 million Palestinians. No one is going to remove these settlers from the lands their state has stolen for them.

Second, Israel relies on Palestinian water to survive. The Jewish state controls the mountain and coastal aquifers that sit under Palestinian land. Relinquishing control of those resources is not an option for any Israeli leader.

Finally, the Jordan Valley is too strategically important from a military perspective for Israel to withdraw from it. Israeli army regulars will always have a presence there. The Jordan Valley sits in the West Bank, which means that the Israeli army will always be in the West Bank.

There are more realities that bear on the question of whether the Jewish state will continue to exist.

Twenty-five percent of Israelis (not counting refugees like me in the Occupied Territories who don't have an Israeli passport or citizenship) are not Jewish. America is more Christian than Israel is Jewish. There are fewer African Americans proportionally in America than there are Palestinians in Israel. And all of those non-Jewish Israelis are having more children than the Jewish ones are.

In Israel, they call this the "demographic problem." I don't know how they propose to solve their demographic problem.

Today, there is numerical parity between Jews and Palestinians in the Holy Land. And since we Palestinians do not accept the argument that it was necessary to ethnically cleanse Palestine to establish a Jewish state, we are inconveniently calling for our rights.

The late Tony Judt described the Jewish state as an anachronism. Perhaps if Israel had been established in 1848 the indigenous population -- the Palestinians -- would have faded from view. But history had a different plan for the world's last colony.

Many of us in Palestine/Israel, including many non-Zionist Jews, are working toward real democracy in the country. I am confident that we will succeed in creating a race-blind society. Perhaps Rabbi Kahn will help us achieve our humanist goal.

Ahmed Moor is a graduate student in public policy at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of The Jerusalem Fund.

Click here for more Reports and Commentary

To view this article online, please go to http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/opinionshop/detail?entry_id=88367.

Abreast of Fast-Moving Developments!

2011-05-04T04:56:00.000-07:00

I'm sending two important messages. One from Jimmy Carter (I think he's right on).
The other is from Haaretz. Bibi (the Israeli PM) claims Palestinians have to choose either "peace" or "Hamas" (can't have both). But the real choice is this: Israel must choose between "peace" and a "racist state" (according to Sefi Rachlevsky). JRK (with thanks to our man on the ground, Doug Dicks).

Support the Palestinian unity government
By Jimmy Carter
Wednesday - May 4, 2011
The Washington Post

This is a decisive moment. Under the auspices of the Egyptian government, Palestine’s two major political movements — Fatah and Hamas — are signing a reconciliation agreement on Wednesday that will permit both to contest elections for the presidency and legislature within a year. If the United States and the international community support this effort, they can help Palestinian democracy and establish the basis for a unified Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza that can make a secure peace with Israel. If they remain aloof or undermine the agreement, the situation in the occupied Palestinian territory may deteriorate with a new round of violence against Israel. Support for the interim government is critical, and the United States needs to take the lead.

This accord should be viewed as a Palestinian contribution to the “Arab awakening,” as well as a deep wish to heal internal divisions. Both sides understand that their goal of an independent Palestinian state cannot be achieved if they remain divided. The agreement also signals the growing importance of an emerging Egyptian democracy. Acting as an honest broker, the interim Egyptian government coaxed both sides to agreement by merging the October 2009 Cairo Accord that Fatah signed with additions that respond to Hamas’s reservations.

The accord commits both sides to consensus appointments of an election commission and electoral court. I have observed three elections in the Palestinian territory, and these institutions have already administered elections that all international observers found to be free, fair, honest and free of violence.

The two parties also pledge to appoint a unity government of technocrats — i.e., neither Fatah nor Hamas. Security will be overseen by a committee set up by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), and Egypt will assist.

Why should the United States and the international community support the agreement? First, it respects Palestinian rights and democracy. In 2006, Hamas won the legislative election, but the “Quartet” — the United States, the European Union, the United Nations and Russia — rejected it and withheld aid, and the unity government collapsed. Competition between the two factions turned vicious, and each side has arrested the other’s activists. Instead of exacerbating differences between the two parties, the international community should help them resolve disagreements through electoral and legislative processes.

Second, with international support, the accord could lead to a durable cease-fire. Israel and the United States are concerned that Hamas could use a unity government to launch attacks against Israel. I have visited the Israeli border town of Sderot and share their concern. I urged Hamas’s leaders to stop launching rockets, and they attempted to negotiate a lasting mutual cease-fire. The United States and other Quartet members should assist Hamas and Israel’s search for a cease-fire.

Third, the accord could be a vehicle to press for a final peace agreement for two states. Abu Mazen will be able to negotiate on behalf of all Palestinians. And with Quartet support, a unity government can negotiate with Israel an exchange of prisoners for the captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit and a settlement freeze. In my talks with Hamas leader Khaled Meshal, he said Hamas would accept a two-state agreement that is approved in a Palestinian referendum. Such an agreement could provide mutual recognition — Israel would recognize an independent Palestinian state and Palestine would recognize Israel. In other words, an agreement will include Hamas’s recognition of Israel.

Suspicions of Hamas stem from its charter, which calls for Israel’s destruction. I find the charter repugnant. Yet it is worth remembering that Israel negotiated the Oslo Accords with the Palestine Liberation Organization while its charter had similar provisions. It took five more years before the PLO Charter was altered.

Many Israelis say that as long as the Palestinians are divided, there is no partner for peace. But at the same time, they refuse to accept a unity government. In Cairo this week, the Palestinians are choosing unity. It is a fragile unity, but the Quartet should work with them to make it secure and peaceful enough to jump-start final-status negotiations with Israel.

The writer was the 39th president of the United States. He founded the not-for-profit Carter Center, which seeks to advance peace and health worldwide.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/support-the-palestinian-unity-government/2011/05/03/AFSbd6iF_story.html?hpid=z7

Israel must choose between peace and a racist state
Netanyahu needs to face a simple, clear-cut question: Do you want a democratic state based on the 1967 borders, or not?
By Sefi Rachlevsky
Ha'aretz -- Wednesday - May 4, 2011

The slogan that brought Benjamin Netanyahu to power was "making a secure peace." That is no accident. "Peace" has maintained the right-wing government to a much greater extent than the right-wing government has maintained peace.
The reason for this is simple. When "peace" is at issue, the domestic debate is diverted to the image of the "other," the one with whom peace should or should not be made. From there, the road is short in Israel to governmental scorn for the weakness of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and for assertions, like those of Netanyahu, that Hamas is a continuation of the Nazis.

But the cyclical Israeli calendar, which moves from "Holocaust" to "Independence," reminds us of what ought to have been self-evident. There is one question that must precede the question of "peace" - a question that constitutes the essence of independence and formed the basis of the Zionist revolution: What does Israel want?

Not for nothing is that question ignored by the government. For when you ask what Israel wants, the requisite answer is clear: a state based on the borders in which it achieved independence, known today as the 1967 borders; a democratic state in which all are equal, as described in the Declaration of Independence.

This answer is dangerous to the right, because most Israelis still support it and it is also accepted internationally. Moreover, it has potency in any situation, even when all eyes are made to look outward, on relations between Fatah and Hamas. If Defense Minister Ehud Barak is right that Hamas capitulated to Fatah, the way is open for a successful implementation of a two-state solution based on the 1967 lines. And if the opposite is true, an Israel that has chosen a democratic state in the 1967 borders has a wealth of available options that would enable it to look out for itself with widespread international support.

But the question of what Israel wants has a second possible answer: Israel wants a racist messianic state, one in which Jews are citizens and non-Jews are subjects. This second answer is not fantastic. In essence, this has been the Israeli reality for 44 years already. In the territories, and also in Jerusalem, Jews are citizens and non-Jews aren't. Just this week, the science minister (! ) presented an award to Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu at a ceremony in which the latter advocated cleansing Safed of Arabs.

Barak, an adherent of the method of verbal misdirection used to enable special-forces operations, dragged "the Third Way" out of storage to be the platform of his Atzmaut party. But Barak knows better than anyone that there is no third way. In special operations, in business and in policy alike, the decision is simple and clear: yes or no. Either Israel wants a state based on the promises of its Declaration of Independence, or it doesn't.

To flee this simple truth, former Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir (Likud ) invented what his staffers termed the "teaspoon" policy at the 1991 Madrid Conference: endless negotiating sessions at which mountains of sugar would be stirred into oceans of tea and coffee, but no agreement would ever be reached. Netanyahu has perfected this method, which enables him to keep stirring sugar into the negotiators' cups forever instead of answering the question of what Israel wants.

But the time for teaspoons has ended. September 2011 is imminent. U.S. President Barack Obama, who came to power on the wings of domestic opposition to racism, has now just scored a victory over racism and messianism abroad. Regardless of whether or not he is personally a fan of Zionism, America's interests and international developments have granted him the ability to help distance Israel from racism and restore its independence.

To do this, it is necessary to end the witch's brew of peace, teaspoons and ambiguity, and bring Netanyahu face to face, both at home and abroad, with this simple, clear-cut question: Do you want a democratic state based on the 1967 borders, or not? There is no other question. But the requisite answer is not a facile breath of air. It requires dismantling the settlements outside Israel's borders, bursting the racist-messianic bubble that is taking over Israel's educational and legal systems, and putting rabbis like Eliyahu on trial instead of granting them awards.

Now is the time to answer that one question, the one that founded Israel 63 years ago: What does Israel want?

http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/israel-must-choose-between-peace-and-a-racist-state-1.359742

James Wall Assesses the Current Situation

2011-05-02T05:45:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend of Israelis and Palestinians,
Jim Wall, a long-time observer of our region, brings us an up to the minute assessment of the situation in Isr/Pal.
The US and Israel are no longer the driving forces over there, thank God. Oh, we have clout all right and can continue to try to dictate matters.
But the Arab Spring, Egypt and our support for dictators (non-democrates) is crumbling. Democratic forces have overtaken the US/Isr efforts to dictate "progress" on negotiations. There have been no meaningful negotiations. It's all been window-dressing for continued Israeli domination of the narrative. There has been NO opening to the Palestinian narrative, it's grievances and calls for justice.
But read Wall's synopsis. JRK

Why Palestinian Unity is the Only Option that Works for Palestinians
By James M. Wall

You would not know it from reading/viewing the American media, which parrots whatever Israel’s leaders say, but Bibi Netanyahu is secretly delighted that Fatah and Hamas have reached a unity agreement.

The official line, of course, is that the Israeli prime minister is outraged that the Palestinian Fatah leadership has actually embraced the Hamas leadership. The leaders of the two parties are shown here, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh (left) and Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas.

Ha’aretz reported from Jerusalem that, upon hearing of the unity agreement, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu laid down his marker: “the Palestinian Authority must choose whether it is interested in peace with Israel or reconciliation with Hamas.”

This is an empty option, one that Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) knows is empty.

The London Guardian explains what lies behind Fatah’s willingness to finally work for unity with Hamas:

There are three chief reasons why, after four years of bitter and violent conflict between the rivals, Fatah acceded to all of Hamas’s political conditions to form a national unity government.

The first was the publication of the Palestine papers, the secret record of the last fruitless round of talks with Israel. The extent to which Palestinian negotiators were prepared to bend over backwards to accommodate Israel surprised even hardened cynics.

The Palestinian Authority found itself haemorrhaging what little authority it had left. The second was the loss to the Palestinian president, Abu Mazen, of his closest allies in Hosni Mubarak and his henchman Omar Suleiman. While they were still around, Gaza’s back door was locked. But the third reason had little to do with either of the above:

Abu Mazen’s faith in Barack Obama finally snapped. For a man who dedicated his career to the creation of a Palestinian state through negotiation, the turning point came when the US vetoed a UN resolution condemning Israel’s settlement-building. In doing so, the US vetoed its own policy.

To make the point, the resolution was drafted out of the actual words Hillary Clinton used to condemn construction. Fatah’s frustration with all this has now taken political form.

Long-time Bibi Watcher James Zogby knows why it was time for Fatah to give up on both Bibi and Barack. Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute, wrote in Huffington Post:

What is, of course, galling. is the assumption implicit in [Netanhyahu's] framing of the matter, namely, that peace with his government is a real possibility that the Palestinians have now rejected. In reality, the Netanyahu government has shown no interest in moving toward peace — unless on terms they dictate and the Palestinians accept.

While feigning disappointment at this Palestinian move, Netanyahu must privately be delighted. The pressure he was feeling to deliver some “concessions” to the Palestinians in his upcoming speech to the U.S. Congress has now been relieved.

This unity between Fatah and Hamas is inevitable. The problem for the US Congress and Israel is that they cannot face reality. These two soul mates in repression continue to pretend the future belongs to them. They keep making the same mistakes. For example:

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) has invited Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu to deliver a speech before a joint session of Congress while he is in Washington May 22-24, to address the AIPAC policy conference.

The AIPAC Policy Conference, scheduled for May 22-24 in Washington, is, according to the AIPAC web page, “the pro-Israel community’s preeminent annual gathering”.

MJ Rosenberg, Senior Foreign Policy Fellow, Media Matters Action Network, writes in Huffington Post:

The Israeli response to news that Palestinian factions had achieved a unity agreement was predictably irritating. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu derided the agreement in stark terms, saying that the Palestinians had a choice of either “Peace with Israel or peace with Hamas”.

The narrative that Israel is pushing is that Fatah’s embrace of Hamas will eliminate any chance for peace. It is a false narrative. Rosenberg explains why the union of Fatah and Hamas is the only option available to the Palestinians.

Certainly, the Palestinians cannot look to the Netanyahu government to endorse any plan that is not totally dictated by Israel. Rosenberg puts it this way: “Israel has shown no interest in moving toward peace — unless on terms they dictate and the Palestinians accept.”

Rosenberg predicts that the US Congress will fall quickly into the Bibi narrative: Condemn the Palestinians and withhold aid until they stop all this “unity” foolishness.

The problem with this old scenario, which has worked to keep the Palestinians in bondage since 1948, is that things have changed since the outbreak of the Arab Spring. Change in the Middle East is coming, slowly in some areas, more quickly in others. Some change will be violent; other changes will be relatively peaceful.

When Egypt ousted a brutal dictator, Israel lost a “reliable” neighbor to the south, a neighbor who played a major role in oppressing its fellow Arabs in Palestine. The Egyptian-Gaza border will now be opened, according to an Al Jazeera report.

Egypt’s foreign minister said in an interview with Al-Jazeera on Thursday [April 28] that preparations were underway to open the Rafah border crossing with Gaza on a permanent basis.

A unified Fatah-Hamas Palestinian government is no guarantee that Israel will retreat behind the 1967 border, tear down that obscene wall, and give up its military control of the Palestinian people. Such a radical reversal of the current reality will take time. But one thing is certain: The Arab Spring has unleashed a demand for freedom and self-government that has been dormant for far too long.

This demand for freedom extends from Ramallah to Rafah, from Cairo to Jerusalem. No AIPAC Policy Conference and no cheers for Bibi in the US Congress can hold back this demand for freedom.

Philip Weiss, who co-edits, along with Adam Horowitz, the indispensable Mondoweiss web site, sounded like a Protestant evangelist with this Word on how slow his fellow Jewish journalists have been to grasp the reality of Israel’s role as an inspiration for the Arab Spring:

My theme today is denial, specifically as it involves the Arab revolutions: the failure of American media figures and Jewish leaders to recognize the huge spiritual-political effect of the Arab spring and the inevitability of that spirit coming to bear on the dire human-rights situation in Palestine.

As Issandr El Amrani said the other night at the 92d Street Y, this revolution has the promise of the French revolution, and to seek to diminish it or to caricature it (the Muslim Brotherhood is going to take over Jordan, Yossi Klein Halevi warned at the American Jewish Committee today) is a terrible mistake.

And this denial is most profound inside American liberal Jewish life, in the failure of liberals to understand, Of course Palestinians will also want their spring. And they must have it.

I will give you two instances of this denial. The first was Terry Gross interviewing Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker on Fresh Air the other day, all about the Arab revolutions and Egypt and Obama’s foreign policy. And you will see from the transcript that Israel was mentioned only once, and tangentially.

The conceit of this nearly-hour-long exchange was the idea, Well these Arab countries are finally going to try to be democratic, harrumph, and Obama must lend his hand.

With no awareness at all that (a), American support for Israel has militated against Arab democracy and the idea of Arab self-determination forever, and (b), that the thirst for democracy in the Middle East portends revolutionary change in one of the most repressive societies in the world, the Israeli occupation of Palestine.

If that is not preaching, then, gentle reader, you don’t know preaching.

Finally, Tariq Ali, editor of the New Left Review, and a frequent contributor to the London Guardian, traces the recent history that led up to the Arab Spring, the upheaval that inspired such evangelistic zeal from Weiss.

His language is less evangelistic, and more poetic, uplifting and insightful:

The patchwork political landscape of the Arab world – the client monarchies, degenerated nationalist dictatorships and the imperial petrol stations known as the Gulf states – was the outcome of an intensive experience of Anglo-French colonialism.

This was followed, after the second world war, by a complex process of imperial transition to the United States. The result was a radical anti colonial Arab nationalism and Zionist expansionism within the wider framework of the cold war.

When the cold war ended, Washington took charge of the region, initially through local potentates then through military bases and direct occupation. Democracy never entered the frame, enabling the Israelis to boast that they alone were an oasis of light in the heart of Arab darkness.

Darkness in this context, however, is a relative term. The Arab people who have walked in darkness in the colonial period, have begun to see the light. No amount of Israeli deception, nor of US congressional blindness, will change the fact that the Arab Spring has revealed a future to the Arab people in which bondage is no longer tolerated.

MJ Rosenberg's Rebuttal of Michael Oren's Plea for "Special Relationship" betw US and Isr

2011-04-28T15:46:00.000-07:00

Recently, Israeli Ambassador to the US, Michael Oren wrote an op-ed where he argued that the US and Israel should maintain their "special relationship" for all its benefits to the US.
Today (Thursday, April 28), the American Jewish Council ran a two page advertisement in the Wall Street Journal equally touting our "Special Relationship".
Stephen M. Walt, Harvard professor, begs to differ, as in this post. JRK

Whiff of DesperationMichael Oren's unconvincing argument for the U.S.-Israel special relationship.
BY STEPHEN M. WALT | APRIL 25, 2011

It is an ambassador's job to burnish his government's image; fidelity to the usual canons of logic and evidence are neither required nor expected. It is therefore unsurprising that Michael Oren's portrait of Israel as America's "ultimate ally" is a one-sided distortion of reality.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Ultimate Ally
By Michael Oren

Friends Forever?
By Jeffrey Goldberg

Our Kind of Realism
By Aluf Benn

The Long View
By Robert Satloff
The main targets of Oren's hasbara -- Hebrew for public diplomacy -- are some unnamed "realists," meaning anyone who questions the net benefits of America's so-called "special relationship" with Israel. All of the realists I know support Israel's existence and do not deny that the United States derives some modest benefits from its ties with the Jewish state. However, they point out that many of these benefits (e.g., trade, scientific exchange, etc.) do not require a "special relationship" -- one in which Israel gets extensive and unconditional economic, military, and diplomatic support -- and they maintain that the costs of the current "special relationship" outweigh the benefits. Unconditional U.S. support has also facilitated policies -- most notably settlement building -- that have undermined Israel's global standing and placed its long-term future in jeopardy. Accordingly, realists believe that a more normal relationship would be better for the United States and Israel alike.

Not surprisingly, Oren would prefer that the United States continue backing Israel to the hilt no matter what it does. His first line of argument is the odd suggestion that Americans have been Zionists ever since the Founding Fathers (i.e., even before modern Zionism existed). Some early U.S. leaders did have biblically inspired notions about "returning Jews to the Holy Land," but that fact tells us nothing about the proper relationship between the United States and Israel today. America's Founding Fathers also opposed colonialism, for example, so one might just as easily argue that they would oppose Israel's occupation of the West Bank and support the Palestinians' efforts to secure their own independence. George Washington also warned Americans to avoid "passionate attachments" to any foreign nations, in good part because he believed it would distort U.S. domestic politics and provide avenues for foreign influence. Thus, Oren's highly selective reading of past U.S. history offers little grounds for unconditional support today.
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Oren's second line of argument is the familiar claim that the United States and Israel share identical "democratic values." Yet this argument cannot explain why the United States gives Israel so much support, and gives it unconditionally. After all, there are many democracies in the world, but none has a special relationship with the United States like Israel does.

It is true that both states are formally democratic, but there are also fundamental differences between the two countries. The United States is a liberal democracy, where people of any race, religion, or ethnicity are supposed to enjoy equal rights. Israel, by contrast, was explicitly founded as a Jewish state, and non-Jews in Israel are second-class citizens both de jure and de facto. To take but one example, Palestinians who marry Israeli Jews are not permitted to become citizens of Israel themselves. This may make sense given Israel's self-definition, but it is wholly at odds with deep-rooted American values.

Just as importantly, Israel's democratic status is undermined by its imposition of a legal, administrative, and military regime in the occupied territories that denies the Palestinians there basic human rights, as well as by its prolonged, government-backed effort to colonize these conquered lands with Jewish settlers. Like all colonial enterprises, maintaining Israeli control of the occupied territories depends on heavy-handed coercion. Such behavior is at odds with core American values -- as U.S. administrations of both parties have said repeatedly, if not forcefully enough.

Oren's third line of argument is that Israel is a unique strategic asset, implying that unconditional support for Israel makes Americans safer at home. For example, he claims that Israel maintains stability in the eastern Mediterranean. But that is not true. Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982 made the region less stable and led directly to the creation of Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite militia. The United States eventually had to send troops into Lebanon because Israel had created such a mess, and that decision led to a suicide attack on the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut in which 241 American servicemen died. Similarly, Israel's assault on Lebanon in 2006 killed more than a thousand Lebanese (many of them civilians), inflicted billions of dollars of property damage, undermined the U.S.-backed "Cedar Revolution," and enhanced Hezbollah's political influence within Lebanon. Finally, Israeli control of the occupied territories led directly to the first and second intifadas and the brutal 2008-2009 war on Gaza -- all of which created enormous popular blowback in the region. None of these events were in America's strategic interest, and they belie the claim that Israel is somehow bringing "stability" to the region.

Israel's limited strategic value is further underscored by its inability to contribute to a more crucial U.S. interest: access to oil in the Persian Gulf. Israel could not help preserve American access to oil after the Shah of Iran fell in 1979, so the United States had to create its own Rapid Deployment Force, which could not operate out of Israel. When the U.S. Navy was busy escorting oil tankers during the Iran-Iraq War, Israel did nothing to help, and it remained on the sidelines in the 1991 Gulf War as well. In fact, after Saddam Hussein fired Scud missiles at Israel in a failed attempt to provoke it into joining the war and disrupting the Gulf War coalition, the United States had to divert military assets from that fight in order to protect Israel. As historian Bernard Lewis (a strong supporter of Israel) remarked afterward, "The change [in Israel's strategic value] was clearly manifested in the Gulf War.... Israel was not an asset, but an irrelevance -- some even said a nuisance."

Israel was also no help during the more recent war in Iraq. Although prominent Israeli politicians such as Ehud Barak, Benjamin Netanyahu, and Shimon Peres all endorsed toppling Saddam (and Barak and Netanyahu published op-eds in U.S. newspapers to help convince Americans to back the war), Israel was not an active member of the "coalition of the willing" and has remained on the sidelines for the past eight years while U.S. troops have been fighting and dying on the streets of Baghdad and Fallujah.

In addition to overstating the benefits of the special relationship, Oren also ignores or denies its obvious costs. He is silent about Israel's extensive efforts to spy on the United States, which the U.S. Government Accountability Office has described as "the most aggressive espionage operation against the United States of any U.S. ally." And he says nothing about Israel's arms sales to Iran in the 1980s, its transfer of sensitive U.S. defense technology to potential adversaries such as China, or its refusal to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. He makes much of the supposedly valuable intelligence information that Israel provides to the United States, but says nothing about Israel's tendency to manipulate Washington by hyping external threats. Since the early 1990s, for example, Israeli officials have repeatedly warned that Iran was on the brink of getting a nuclear bomb, a series of false forecasts that were mostly intended to elicit greater support from the United States.

Oren also maintains that the special relationship between the United States and Israel has nothing to do with anti-Americanism in the Arab world or the motivations of terrorist groups like al Qaeda. In his view, there is no linkage whatsoever between U.S. support for Israel, Israel's treatment of the Palestinians, and the widespread hostility that the United States faces in the Arab and Islamic world. Not only does this claim fail the common-sense test, but making it also requires Oren to ignore a mountain of evidence to the contrary and leads him to make up stories that are simply untrue.

For example, Oren claims that "[Osama] bin Laden initially justified his attacks on America's profligacy and only later, after his setbacks in Afghanistan, linked them to Israel." This assertion is false. Bin Laden's first public statement intended for a wide audience -- released in December 1994 -- directly addressed the Palestinian issue. According to terrorism experts Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon, the "most prominent grievance" in bin Laden's 1996 fatwa against the West was what he termed the "Zionist-Crusader alliance." In 1997, bin Laden told CNN's Peter Arnett, "We declared jihad against the U.S. government because ... it has committed acts that are extremely unjust, hideous, and criminal, whether directly or through its support of the Israeli occupation of [Palestine]." Needless to say, these and many similar statements predate 9/11 or the "setbacks" in Afghanistan to which Oren refers.

And bin Laden is hardly the only example. The 9/11 Commission reported that 9/11 plotter Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's "animus toward the United States stemmed not from his experiences there as a student, but rather from his violent disagreement with U.S. foreign policy favoring Israel." Other anti-American terrorists -- such as Ramzi Yousef, who led the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center -- have offered similar explanations for their anger toward the United States.

Despite Oren's denials, therefore, it is clear that one major cost of the special relationship is a heightened risk of anti-American terrorism. U.S. support for Israel is not the only source of anti-American extremism, of course, but it is an important one and it makes no sense to try to deny it.

There is also abundant survey evidence confirming that the special relationship is a powerful source of anti-American feeling throughout the Arab and Islamic world. In 2003, the State Department's Advisory Group on Public Diplomacy found that "Citizens in [Arab] countries are genuinely distressed at the plight of Palestinians and at the role they perceive the United States to be playing." In 2004, the Defense Science Board, an advisory group to the Pentagon, concluded that "Muslims do not 'hate our freedom,' but rather, they hate our policies. The overwhelming majority voice their objections to what they see as one-sided support in favor of Israel and against Palestinian rights, and the longstanding, even increasing support for what Muslims collectively see as tyrannies, most notably Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Pakistan, and the Gulf states." As the 9/11 Commission acknowledged that same year, "it is simply a fact that American policy regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and American actions in Iraq are dominant staples of popular commentary across the Arab and Muslim world."

More recent surveys of Arab opinion confirm strong Arab disapproval of U.S. support for Israel and of U.S. handling of the Palestinian issue. According to the 2010 Brookings Institution/University of Maryland survey of public opinion in six Arab countries, the most frequently cited source of disappointment was the Obama administration's "Arab/Palestinian-Israeli policy." And when respondents were asked to name two countries they regarded as threatening, the top two answers were Israel (88 percent) and the United States (77 percent). It is perhaps worth noting that only 10 percent of respondents mentioned Iran.

Oren tries to explain this away by saying that Arab leaders are far more worried about Iran, and he quotes Saudi King Abdullah's request (as revealed by WikiLeaks) that the United States "cut off the head of the snake" (Iran). There is no question that some Arab leaders are concerned about Iran, but it does not follow that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is of little importance to them or to their subjects. As the Center for American Progress's Matthew Duss documented in a previous Foreign Policy article, the WikiLeaks cables contain abundant statements by Arab leaders highlighting the importance of the Palestinian issue to them, and U.S. officials are repeatedly told that ending the occupation is critical to improving America's position in the region.

Moreover, even if Iran is a growing concern, the combination of the special relationship and Israel's continued colonization of the West Bank makes that problem harder, not easier, to address. Iran exploits the Palestinian issue to put its Arab rivals on the defensive because Tehran knows that it resonates with Arab publics. By championing the Palestinian cause, Iran makes it more difficult for Arab governments to form a united front against Tehran or collaborate openly with the United States. That is one reason why both former Centcom commander David Petraeus and his successor, Gen. James Mattis, have told Congress that the continuation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a serious liability when trying to address major problems elsewhere in the region.

Oddly enough, Oren seems to be partially aware of this fact, though he fails to draw the right conclusions. He correctly notes that protests about Israel have been "[c]onspicuously absent" in the upheavals that have been convulsing Arab states over the past few months. He then warns "emerging Arab governments might in the future ... seek to gain legitimacy by harnessing anti-Israeli sentiment." But if the Palestinian issue did not resonate strongly with Arab publics, how could Arab rulers "gain legitimacy" by highlighting it?

The bottom line is that the special relationship with Israel makes it much more difficult to achieve America's main strategic aims in the Middle East. This is not to say that the challenges Washington faces would disappear if the Israeli-Palestinian conflict were resolved or if the United States had a more normal relationship with Israel. That's a straw man to which few serious analysts subscribe. But there is little question that a just peace would make it much easier for Washington to pursue its other interests in the region.

Finally, Oren denies that the "so-called Israel Lobby" has anything to do with the current special relationship and claims it has no impact on U.S. support for the Jewish state or American policy more generally. To support this fantastic claim, he quotes longtime Mideast advisor Dennis Ross saying that the United States has never based its actions on what the "lobby" wanted or refrained from doing something because it thought groups in the lobby might be upset. To put it politely, this is fatuous. For one thing, Ross is hardly an objective source on this matter, having previously worked as counselor to the Washington Institute for Near East Policy (a spinoff of AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee) and as chairman of the Jewish People Policy Institute, a Jerusalem-based think tank. Ross is just about the last person on the planet who is going to admit that the lobby exerts a powerful influence on U.S. Middle East policy, and the fact that Oren relies on his testimony tells you just how weak his argument is.

Furthermore, Ross's claim is belied by testimony from other equally experienced observers. For example, Ross's former deputy, Aaron David Miller, has described how the United States acted as "Israel's lawyer" during the Oslo peace process, a role that contributed significantly to Oslo's failure. Miller's subsequent book, The Much Too Promised Land, acknowledged the power of the lobby but said it was not all-powerful (another straw-man view that few serious analysts hold); yet he also admitted "those of us advising the secretary of state and the president were very sensitive to what the pro-Israel community was thinking and, when it came to considering ideas that Israel didn't like, too often engaged in a kind of preemptive self-censorship."

And that is why former U.S. President Bill Clinton referred to AIPAC as "better than anyone else lobbying in this town" and why former Rep. Lee Hamilton said, "There's no lobby group that matches it.... They're in a class by themselves." Barry Goldwater, the late Arizona senator, said he was "never put under greater pressure than by the Israeli lobby," and former Sen. Fritz Hollings once said, "You can't have an Israeli policy other than what AIPAC gives you around here [i.e., on Capitol Hill]."

Even a staunch defender of Israel like Alan Dershowitz admits, "My generation of Jews ... became part of what is perhaps the most effective lobbying and fund-raising effort in the history of democracy." I can understand why Oren wants to deny all of this; what I don't understand is why he thinks anyone will believe him.

Moreover, as John Mearsheimer and I documented in our book, "pro-Israel" groups in the United States use a variety of methods to encourage public support for Israel and make sure that the special relationship remains firmly in place. These tactics include making sure that individuals deemed insufficiently sympathetic to Israel do not get important government positions; attempting to silence, smear, or marginalize anyone who questions U.S. support for Israel or criticizes the policies of the Israeli government; and trying to shape discourse so that the pro-Israel arguments that Oren touts in his article are treated as received truths. Just ask Chas Freeman.

In the end, it is hard not to see Oren's article as a sign of desperation. A more open discourse about Israel is beginning to emerge in the United States, and that will gradually make it harder for American politicians to continue their craven subservience to the lobby. Furthermore, younger American Jews are less enchanted with an Israel that is drifting steadily rightward and whose political system is increasingly dysfunctional and ridden with scandal. Autocracies like Hosni Mubarak's regime in Egypt actively colluded with Israel, but future Arab leaders are likely to be more responsive to popular sentiment and less tolerant of Israel's brutal suppression of Palestinian rights. If the United States wants these countries' policies to be congenial to its core interests, it will have to make its own policies more congenial to Arab peoples, not just their rulers.

Given these trends, Israel ought to be doing everything in its power to help create a viable Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza before it is too late. Obama was right when he said that a two-state solution was in "Israel's interest, Palestine's interest, America's interest, and the world's interest." Unfortunately, the government that Oren serves is more interested in expanding settlements, and its vision of a Palestinian "state" is a set of disconnected and impoverished bantustans under full Israeli control. This is called apartheid, and it is contrary to the position of the past three U.S. presidents, not only because it is not in America's strategic interest, but also because it contradicts core American values.

As then Prime Minister Ehud Olmert warned in 2007, "If the day comes when the two-state solution collapses and we face a South African-style struggle for equal voting rights," then "the state of Israel is finished." If this regrettable event were to occur, future historians will render a harsh verdict on anyone who helped derail or delay those peace efforts, including official propagandists like Ambassador Oren.

More Nails in the Two--State Coffin

2011-04-27T10:02:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,
It's the long, sad, enduring tale of reality on the ground in Isr/Pal.
To those who think I'm always favoring the Palestinian "narrative", it is because underlying injustices continue to fester unattended, with US complicity. JRK

Israel's West Bank policies render the two-state solution DOA
Despite Netanyahu's rhetoric, the facts on the ground - illegal outposts, failure to abide by court rulings, unfettered settler activity- make peace a distant dream.

By Akiva Eldar
Ha'aretz -- Wednesday - April 27, 2011

The very first meeting between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Barack Obama following the latter's assumption of the American presidency was preceded by a dramatic decision by Israel's Supreme Court. On May 18, 2009, the High Court of Justice issued gave the state 90 days to detail steps it had taken to dismantle six unauthorized outposts in the West Bank (Mitzpeh Lachish, Givat Asaf, Ramat Gilad, Ma'aleh Rehavam, Mitzpeh Yitzhar and Givat Haro'eh) .

As with all outposts, the houses, roads and infrastructure in these locations had all been constructed illegally, some on private Palestinian land. And, following a petition by the left-wing NGO Peace Now, the justices demanded that the state explain why it had not ousted these trespassers.

A few days later, Netanyahu announced in his Bar-Ilan speech that his "vision for peace includes two free peoples living in this small country with mutual respect as good neighbors." One can only assume that being a "good neighbor" doesn't for him mean the systematic theft of lands owned by Palestinian farmers, under the aegis of both the government and the Israel Defense Forces.

And yet, as Netanyahu's next meeting with Obama approaches, it turns out that the half dozen outposts featured in the petition are still standing. Civil and military authorities are spitting in the High Court's face, and the judges accept that spit as they would blessed rainfall. The outposts are a badge of shame for both the State of Israel and the High Court. There's no better emblem of the gap between the "two states for two peoples" rhetoric expressed by Netanyahu at Bar-Ilan and the policies that mark that solution as dead on arrival.

The 90 days the High Court gave the state in May 2009 are long past, with one delay following another. At the beginning of March (in other words, more than 20 months since the petition was filed), the State Prosecutor's Office submitted an affidavit to the High Court, saying that in a meeting convened by the prime minister in late February, attended by security officials and the attorney general, it was decided that "illegal construction on private land will be removed."

Regarding petition 7891/07, which deals with the said six outposts, the affidavit stated that, the relevant authorities "have been ordered to work toward the removal of illegal construction located on private land by the end of the year."

Because of this, the High Court decided on March 23 to give both the state and settlers more time to dispossess Palestinian land owners; the justices asked Defense Minister Ehud Barak and the commander of the IDF troops in the West Bank to submit a supplementary affidavit by November, in which they were to outline the steps required to execute the position expressed in the current affidavit.

Meanwhile, the West Bank continues to be managed by Wild West rules. Settlers invade private Palestinian land, the state provides infrastructure, the IDF acts as look-out, the Palestinians seek assistance from the High Court of Justice, the State Prosecutor's Office gets a time-out, and the Civil Administration explains that they're "working according to priorities." To illustrate the point, the residents of the village of Deir Jarir recently asked the High Court to evacuate Mitzpeh Kramim settlers, who they say invaded their land and are building new homes. While waiting for a court hearing on the matter, their attorney Hossam Younes presented updated photographs that indicated that construction was underway.

The Justice Ministry said in response that "the construction that appears in the photographs was not undertaken on the lots mentioned in the petition, but rather on adjacent ones." The ministry spokesman suggested that any questions regarding the "adjacent" lots should be directed to the Civil Administration. The Civil Administration, however, relayed that "supervision measures have recently been implemented regarding several structures in the Mitzpeh Kramim area." But the photographs indicate that new construction has been taking place in that area as well.

Love thy neighbor
Another instance of the rule of law and a shining example of how to be a good neighbor comes in the form of a High Court petition submitted by attorney Jiyat Nasr in the name of residents of the town of Daharia in the Hebron Hills, who claim that authorities have for years barred them from entering their own lands, which were annexed to the Sansana settlement.

In early April and after a four-year legal battle, the local Palestinians aided by attorney Kamar Mishraki-Asad from Rabbis for Human Rights won an exceptional legal victory: A settler from Susiya was ordered to evacuate their land and remove a vine he had planted there.

The evacuation order was met by a volley of rocks hurled by settlers at Palestinian shepherds. The squatter did not face criminal justice, the landowners were not compensated for the damage, none of the assailants were arrested, and the land is still off-limits to its lawful owners. The Civil Administration said that they were working on amending the edict which had prevented the Palestinians from entering the compound for the past four years.

All these "trifles" will probably be left out both of Obama's anticipated "pragmatic speech," and Netanyahu's "vision of peace," which he will present before the U.S. Congress in the near future.

Educating for peace
Following the massacre of the Fogel family of Itamar, Netanyahu again rejected Mahmoud Abbas' call to renew the work of a joint Israeli-Palestinian-American committee to end incitement. The reason? The Palestinian president lent his patronage to a ceremony to name a square after a suicide bomber.

During the recent Passover holiday, the Menachem Begin Heritage Center, a government institution which works in conjunction with the Education Minister and receives state funding, proposed a new "trip for the whole family." On the agenda are "the two explosions that shook Jerusalem following action by Etzel at the train station and the King David Hotel." The July 1946 attack at the King David killed almost 100 people - 41 Arabs, 28 Britons, 17 Jews and five others.

http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/israel-s-west-bank-policies-render-the-two-state-solution-doa-1.358426

On Engaging President Obama

2011-04-25T06:15:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,
The US can no longer sit on the sidelines. Change in the ME is scary now and each country seems to require a different US involvement. American engagement with Isr/Pal should be constant, no dithering, no lack of clarity. The outlines of a "process" have long been known.

The political will has been missing from the US, to counter the strong political will of Likud and the settler-backed policies that drive the current administration in Israel.

The NY Times in their Easter editorial, calls for action. JRK (below)

On ENGAGING TEAM OBAMA
April 24, 2011
President Obama and the Peace Process President Obama began his presidency vowing to negotiate an Israeli-Palestinian peace. He backed off in the face of both sides’ obstinacy and after a series of diplomatic missteps. Since then, the stalemate, and the mistrust, have only deepened, and it is clear that nothing good will happen until the United States fully engages.

It is time for Mr. Obama — alone or, better yet, in concert with Europe, Russia and the United Nations — to put a map and a deal on the table.

The outlines of a deal are no secret. They were first proposed by President Bill Clinton in 2000. But neither side has been willing to make the necessary concessions — on land swaps, how Jerusalem can be shared and how many displaced Palestinians can go home, or not. The Israelis need to know that their closest ally won’t enable more inaction. The Palestinians need to know they will have American support so long as their demands are realistic. Mr. Obama needs to speak up before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel pre-empts the debate with what is certain to be an inferior proposal when he addresses a joint meeting of Congress next month.

Mr. Netanyahu has made some concessions, most notably giving Palestinians more control over their own security in the West Bank. But he has long insisted that the Palestinians aren’t serious about negotiating a final deal, and he is now hinting that he will unilaterally offer them an interim, step-by-step arrangement that will put off statehood to some undefined future.

He also has used the upheavals in the Middle East as one more excuse not to act, rather than a reason to reinforce Israel’s security with a durable peace deal.

Mr. Netanyahu — who is coming to speak at the invitation of Representative John Boehner, the House speaker — seems to think that the Republicans’ new power means he has carte blanche in Washington. So long as Mr. Obama sits on the sidelines, he will surely continue to believe that.

The address to Congress isn’t the only deadline Mr. Obama has to worry about. The Palestinians are threatening to ask the United Nations General Assembly — which admitted the state of Israel in 1949 — to declare a Palestinian state when it meets in September. Israel and the United States dismiss this as theater. But it is certain to pass, further isolating Israel. If Washington votes against it, as it inevitably will, it would further isolate this country.

President Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority and his aides have been building their capacity to govern in the West Bank. But Mr. Abbas isn’t helping his cause by refusing to return to the negotiating table. He suspended talks last fall after Israel refused to extend a moratorium on settlement construction. Holding to his position only gives Mr. Netanyahu an excuse not to seriously engage.

The status quo is not sustainable, as a recent surge of violence should make clear. And the options on the ground for creating a territorially coherent Palestinian state keep narrowing as Israel steps up settlement construction in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Israel could oust the settlers — and will have to in certain areas. But the more settlers they let in, the harder it will be politically for any Israeli leader to cut a deal.

Last month, Robert Gates made the first visit to the West Bank by an American defense secretary to reinforce Washington’s commitment to a Palestinian state. But President Obama’s peace envoy, George Mitchell, who is supposed to move the process forward, hasn’t been to the region since December.

Mr. Gates was absolutely correct when he declared in Israel that despite the uncertainty caused by the upheaval in the Arab world, “there is a need and an opportunity for bold action to move toward a two-state solution.” He was talking to the Israelis and the Palestinians. We hope President Obama was listening closely, too.

Jerusalem Christian Leaders Easter Message, 2011

2011-04-19T05:54:00.000-07:00

Easter Message 2011 from the Patriarchs and Heads of Churches in Jerusalem

14 Apr 2011

Alleluia! Christ is Risen. He is Risen Indeed. Alleluia!

We, the Heads of Churches of the Holy City of Jerusalem bring you our greetings and our joy in the celebration of the Resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Christians find their joy is secure in the hope of the promise of eternal life which our Lord has won for all who believe. However, when we in Jerusalem, the city of redemption, see the suffering of our Christian brothers and sisters in Egypt, Iraq and elsewhere in our region our joy becomes more solemn. We find sadness competes with the joy of Easter as we witness the violence which has erupted in the face of peaceful demonstrations by people throughout the Arab world these past months.

We Christians are watching in prayer the developments in the Middle East. We also pray that the reforms would lead to modern civil society where freedom of expression, freedom of religion, human rights — including the rights of those who are considered being a minority in numbers — are respected. We call upon all people of faith and good will to pursue peace while at the same time we recognize that peace cannot be bought at the price of silence and submission to corruption and injustice.

The violence, when it erupts, reminds us that the cross of Christ is ever present for the faithful followers of the Prince of Peace. The crucifixion is an ongoing reality for many of our clergy and people who continue to seek to live with mutual understanding and co-operation with their neighbors.

We urge all Christians to pray for reconciliation among people in the Holy Land, where the deteriorating situation makes peace and justice seem further away than ever before. We ask the Churches around the world to stand with us in giving voice to those who are silenced, in breaking down walls that separate us from one another and in building bridges of goodwill between people.

We pray for the leaders of the nations, and for those who demonstrate for change, to use wisdom and their best judgment to serve the needs of their people and to promote peaceful solutions to change for a better future for all of God’s children. Our Lord died for the sins of the whole world that all people will see in his example how violence only leads to death and destruction. In his resurrection we experience his victory over violence and death and we embrace a vision of the future in which all people live together in harmony.

This vision gives us hope to renew our faith in the face of despair. Christians all over the world celebrate the victory over death which is ours as a gift from God who has compassion and mercy for all of his creation. We share our joy in the resurrection with you. The cross is ever before us day by day and the cross is empty. New life has come. Christ is risen. We are risen. Alleluia. Thanks be to God.

+Patriarch Theophilos III, Greek Orthodox Patriarch
+Patriarch Fouad Twal, Latin Patriarch
+Patriarch Torkom II Manoogian, Armenian Apostolic Orthodox Patriarch
+Fr. Pierbattista Pizzaballa, ofm, Custos of the Holy Land
+Archbishop Anba Abraham, Coptic Orthodox Patriarch, Jerusalem
+Archbishop Swerios Malki Murad, Syrian Orthodox Patriarch
+Archbishop Joseph-Jules Zerey, Greek-Melkite-Catholic Patriarch
+Archbishop Abouna Matthias, Ethiopian Orthodox Patriarch
+Archbishop Paul Sayyah, Maronite Patriarchal Exarch
+Bishop Suheil Dawani, Episcopal Church of Jerusalem and the Middle East
+Bishop Munib Younan, Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land
+Bishop Pierre Malki, Syrian Catholic Patriarchal Exarch
+Fr. Rafael Minassian, Armenian Catholic Patriarchal Exarch

A New Palestine Movement: Young, Networked, and Nonviolent

2011-04-01T19:41:00.000-07:00

A New Palestinian Movement: Young, Networked, Nonviolent
Joe Klein
Time
March 31, 2011 - 12:00am
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2062308,00.html

Fadi Quran is the face of the new Middle East. He is 23, a graduate of Stanford University, with a double major in physics and international relations. He is a Palestinian who has returned home to start an alternative-energy company and see what he can do to help create a Palestinian state. He identifies with neither of the two preeminent Palestinian political factions, Hamas and Fatah. His allegiance is to the Facebook multitudes who orchestrated the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak in Egypt and who are organizing nonviolent protests throughout the region. In the Palestinian territories, the social-networking rebels call themselves the March 15 movement—and I would call Quran one of the leaders of the group except that it doesn't really have leaders yet. It is best described as a loose association of "bubbles," he says, that hasn't congealed. It launched relatively small, semisuccessful protests in the West Bank and Gaza on the aforementioned March 15; it is staging a small, ongoing vigil in the main square of Ramallah. It has plans for future nonviolent actions; it may or may not have the peaceful throngs to bring these off.

I meet with Quran and several other young Palestinians at the local Coca-Cola Bottling Co. headquarters in Ramallah, which tells you something important about this movement: we are not meeting in a mosque. I've known one of them, Fadi El-Salameen, for five years. He was an early volunteer for the Seeds of Peace program, which intermingled Palestinian and Israeli teenagers at a summer camp in Maine. In recent years, El-Salameen has spent much of his time in the U.S. and has achieved a certain prominence—he is quietly charismatic, a world-class networker, the sort of person who is invited to international conferences—but he is now spending more time at home in Hebron, organizing the March 15 movement in the West Bank's largest city. "I met some of the leaders of the Tahrir Square movement at a conference in Doha," he tells me. "They don't fit the usual profile of a 'youth leader.' They are low-key, well educated but not wealthy. They are figuring it out as they go along, trying to figure out what works." (See "Growing Up Palestinian in the Age of the Wall.")

The young Palestinians don't seem as pragmatic as all that; they are somewhere beyond wildly idealistic. "The goal is to liberate the minds of our people," says Najwan Berekdar, an Israeli-born Arab who is a women's-rights activist. "We want to get past all the old identities—Fatah, Hamas, religious, secular, Israeli and Palestinian Arab —and create a mass nonviolent movement." Berekdar has touched on an idea that might prove truly threatening to Israelis: a "one state" movement uniting Palestinians on both sides of the current border. But the young Palestinians have not focused on anything so specific. Their current political plan is to go back to the future—to achieve Palestinian unity by resurrecting and holding elections for a body called the Palestinian National Council, which took a backseat after the Oslo accords created the Palestinian Authority and its parliamentary component. This seems rather abstruse—the basic rule for people-power movements is, Organize first, bureaucratize later — and it would be easy to dismiss these young people as hopelessly naive but for two factors. The first is that they've seized the Palestinian version of a suddenly valuable international brand: the Tahrir Square revolution. "We cannot discount their importance," a prominent Israeli official told me. "Not after what happened in Egypt." (See "In the West Bank, An Economy Without a Nation.")

But equally important are their methods. Ever since Israel won control of the West Bank and Gaza in 1967, the Palestinian national movement has been defined by terrorism, intransigence and, until recently in the West Bank, corruption. It has never been known for dramatic acts of nonviolence. "If they'd been led by Gandhi rather than Yasser Arafat, they would have had a state 20 years ago," Kenneth Pollack of the Saban Center at the Brookings Institution told me. Israeli officials acknowledge that the recent, peaceful economic and security reforms led by Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad have been the most effective tactics the Palestinians have ever used in trying to create a state. But they haven't gotten the Palestinians anywhere in their negotiations with the equally intransigent Israeli government. Jewish settlements continue to expand on Palestinian land. A mass nonviolent movement might tip the balance, especially if the world—including the Israeli public —began to see Palestinians as noble practitioners of passive resistance rather than as suicide bombers.

The Israeli leadership is as perplexed as everyone else about what the revolutionary tide in the region will bring. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he'd prefer dealing with democracies, but he isn't so sure that the Tahrir Square movement will yield a democracy in Egypt (and there are already indications that Egypt's new government will push harder for a Palestinian peace accord than Mubarak ever did). Netanyahu has wisely called for a Marshall Plan for the Middle East, an idea that the Saudis—who seem to agree with the Israelis on practically everything these days—have also quietly endorsed. "If you can't get the young Egyptians involved in big public-works projects, like new housing, which is badly needed," an Israeli intelligence expert told me, "then they're back in the square for sure, only they'll be supporting the Muslim Brotherhood this time."

That seems unduly pessimistic. The Facebook rebels may have more influence on the suddenly antiquated Islamists than vice versa; if there is Shari'a, it will come with alternative-energy start-ups and a Coca-Cola chaser. "You have to wonder what sort of influence this revolution has had on Hamas," a Palestinian Christian said to me. "Are they watching al-Jazeera and seeing nonviolence succeed where terrorism has failed?" (See "In the West Bank: A Visit With a Soon-To-Be Ex-Negotiator.")

The Israelis assume not, which seems a safe assumption: Hamas rule in Gaza is going well, despite the Israeli boycott. "The Hamas military wing is making money off the smuggling from the tunnels [from Egypt into Gaza]," a West Bank businessman tells me. "They sell my product for twice my price. And yet the standard of living is rising in Gaza." In fact, Hamas seems more secure right now than Fatah, despite the economic successes in the West Bank. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has been wounded by the leak to al-Jazeera of private memos that showed Palestinian negotiators making what seemed to be major concessions to the Israelis. In order to restore some of his credibility, Abbas has been reaching out to Hamas, raising the prospect of a reconciliation—and destroying any slim hope of an accord with the Israelis. "Abbas has to choose," a Netanyahu aide told me, "between Hamas and us." (Comment on this story.)

So the stalemate continues—with one exception: the March 15 movement and the rush of history in the region. The young activists may be preoccupied by the chimera of Palestinian unity at the moment, but what happens if they turn their full attention to the Israeli occupation? What happens if they begin to organize marches to protest the near daily outrages perpetrated by Jewish settlers? What if they stage sit-down strikes to open roads that are used by settlers but closed to Palestinians? What if they march 10,000 strong against a settlement that is refusing Palestinians access to a traditional water supply? "If it is nonviolent, then that means, by definition, it is civilized," an Israeli official said. "We have no problem with that." But what if the Palestinians are nonviolent and the Jewish settlers are not? "I think about the dogs unleashed on Martin Luther King in Birmingham," Quran says. "I think about the beatings. That's what it took for Americans to see the justice of his cause. We will be risking our lives, but that is what it takes. I only hope that we're not too well educated to be courageous."

The Jewish Voice for Peace Statement on growing violence

2011-03-26T07:08:00.000-07:00

Dear Friend,
I'm sending you this statement at the request of Cecile Surasky, and the Jewish Voice for Peace. It addresses the growing violence in Israel, Gaza and the West Bank. Our hope is that it will inspire heartfelt conversation, debates and questionings -- and most of all, changes in behavior, on all sides, among all persons. JRK

From Gaza to Jerusalem: JVP Statement on the Escalation of Violence, March 25, 2011
Any act of violence, especially one against civilians, marks a profound failure of human imagination and causes a deep and abiding trauma for all involved. In mourning the nine lives lost in Gaza and the one life lost in Jerusalem this week, we reject the pattern of condemning the deaths of Israelis while ignoring the deaths of Palestinians. We do not discriminate. One life lost is one life too many--whether Palestinian or Israeli.

Within the context of 44 years of the Israeli occupation of Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem, in the past two years (January 31, 2009 to January 31, 2011, starting just after Operation Cast Lead), over a thousand Palestinians have been made homeless by home demolitions, hundreds have been unlawfully detained, and over 150 men, women and children have been killed by the IDF and settlers, according to the Israeli human rights group B’tselem.(1) [numbers in parentheses are referenced below], jrk

Many acres of Palestinian land have been taken and orchards uprooted by armed settlers. Countless hours have been lost at checkpoints, often fruitlessly, while Palestinians attempted to get medical care, jobs, and access to education. One and a half million Gazans have been living with a limited food supply, lack of electricity and dangerously toxic sewage.

This is occupation: daily, persistent acts of structural violence. All in the service of a government that constantly expands illegal Israeli settlements on land that rightfully belongs to Palestinians.

These acts don't reach our headlines because they are so habitual, so we learn not to see them. But Palestinians live them and their profound consequences everyday, and we must keep that in mind, even as we ponder the terrible events of the past few weeks:(2) A person or persons, (we don't know who), bombed a bus stop in Jerusalem, injuring 30 and killing 1 Israeli civilian; An Israeli bombing killed 3 children and an older man in Gaza; A person or persons, (we don't know who), murdered 5 members of a family, including three children, in Itamar, an Israeli settlement in the West Bank; The Israeli government suddenly tightened the siege of Gaza and escalated military attacks, killing a total of 11 Palestinians and injuring more than 40 since mid-March;(3) Palestinians fired over 50 shells and rockets from Gaza into civilian areas in southern Israel.

These terrible acts of violence remind us that to end the Israeli occupation, our best hope is supporting the inspiring nonviolent Palestinian movement for change, in the form of unarmed protests every Friday in places like Bil’in, Ni'lin, Sheikh Jarrah, and the Global Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. This is a movement that respects life, that is part and parcel of the nonviolent democratic people's movements we have been inspired by throughout the Arab world, that welcomes the solidarity and support of Israeli and international believers in equality and universal human rights.

This is a movement that fundamentally subverts the logic of armies, revenge-fueled “price tags”, and armed struggle. And it is a movement that may well do what no other government to date has done-- pressure Israel to be accountable to international law and therefore help create conditions for truly meaningful negotiations.

Because it is so powerful, it is no surprise that the right to engage in nonviolent resistance, a foundational component of any functioning democracy, is under attack in Israel. Human rights activists are being detained or imprisoned. Bills to criminalize the BDS movement, or harass human rights organizations, are working their way through the Knesset.

Just this week:
The very act of publicly commemorating the Nakba, a crucial nonviolent act of Palestinian remembrance, was essentially criminalized in Israel by the Knesset.(4)The Knesset also passed a law allowing small communities in the Galilee and Negev to discriminate against anyone wanting to reside there who does not fit in with the community’s “socio-cultural” character.(5) The Knesset also held hearings to assess whether the “pro-Israel, pro-peace” group J Street was sufficiently pro-Israel.(6)

The IDF announced a new military intelligence-gathering unit solely dedicated to monitoring international left-wing peace and human rights groups that the army sees as a threat to Israel. The department will work closely with government ministries.(7)

Dozens of Israeli soldiers raided the home of Bassem Tamimi, Head of the nonviolent Nabi Saleh Popular Committee, and beat his wife and daughter while arresting him presumably on charges of "incitement" and "organizing illegal demonstrations."(8)

As the Israeli government increasingly deploys anti-democratic measures and military repression, we at Jewish Voice for Peace are redoubling our efforts to support the best hope: a nonviolent Palestinian-led resistance movement in which we all work together to nurture life, justice and equality. We invite you to join the movement.

(1) B'tselem: Fatalities after operation "Cast Lead"
(2) The Guardian, March 23: Israeli-Palestinian tensions: a timeline
(3) Alternative Information Center, March 23: Israel's Military Escalation in Gaza
(4) Jerusalem Post, March 23: Nakba Bill passes Knesset in third reading
(5) +972 Magazine, March 22: Knesset passes segregation bill
(6) New York Times, March 24: U.S. Group Stirs Debate On Being "Pro-Israel"
(7) Ha'aretz, March 21: Military Intelligence monitoring foreign left-wing organizations
and +972 Magazine, March 22: Military Intelligence monitors "de-legitimization"
(8) Popular Struggle, March 24, 2011: Israeli Soldiers arrest Bassem Tamimi, Coordinator of Nabi Saleh Popular Committee