Interview excerpts with the Son of Hamas

Probably the most fascinating figure I have ever come across is Mosab Hassan Yousef, the eldest son of one of the founders of Hamas. After disillusion with Hamas' hypocrisy, Joseph (Yousef) went on a search for the truth ("who is my real enemy?" was his guiding question), and it led him to Christianity. The revolutionary moment for him was hearing from the lips of Jesus words he considered unthinkable: "Love your enemies as yourself." The story is long and I can't go into detail here (read his biography, which made it to the NY Times top 10; I've yet to get round to it). In short: he ended up spying for ten years for Israel's security body, Shin Bet, with the express intention of fulfilling Jesus' words: i.e. to save lives on both sides of the fence. He even negotiated with Shin Bet to have suicide bombers arrested rather than executed, risking his own life in the process. For me, one of the most fascinating and beautiful things about Joseph is the way he constantly emphasises the humanity of terrorists. In contrast to the simplistic and self-righteous attempt to explain them away by calling them "mad men," Joseph talks of them with love in his heart and a yearning for "their salvation," most of all salvation from their own ideology. In light of all this, the latest twist in his inspiring story is so perverse it could almost be in a comedy book rather than a tragedy: the US Inland Security wants him deported to the West Bank as a security threat. The reason: in his biography he describes how working for Shin Bet meant working within Hamas itself (seems obvious to me). Returning to Palestine would mean his execution of course, as conversion from Islam is a capital offence. The hearing, by the way, takes place to day. Pray for him.

For more info, John Hobbins has a round up of relevant sites and videos here. "Joseph's" Facebook page is constantly being updated with the latest news (for example, Inland Security in the States want him deported as a threat) and his website has various videos and information. He even personally authors a blog here.

Today I just want to share some of the latest video excerpts that I've come across in Youtube. They're taken from a Christian conference (I don't know which one) and give you an insight into what really does seem to be the motivating and sustaining factor behind everything that he is doing. If you think that his "political" work can be separated from his "personal faith" (a peculiarly modern dichotomy), than which this powerful interview with CNN's Amanpour. I get the impression that even this hardened interviewer was taken aback, even moved ... . Whatever you think of his opinions, I don't think his voice can be ignored.

So here are the most recent videos:

First, an account of his relationship to his father:

Here he answers the question: "who is my real enemy?:

Here are some comments on "how God is working the the Middle East":

Here he's talking about Jewish and Palestinian converts to Christianity:

Here's an anecdote about worshipping with an Israeli soldier:

The religious significance of ethnic Israel and the canonical shape of Esther

In response to my recent post on Biblical scholarship and the State of Israel, a friend has highlighted the complexity involved in claiming theological continuity between Biblical Israel and the modern Jewish people. The term itself is ambiguous in the Old Testament. As he says:

What does the OT mean by the moniker 'Israel' in any case? Sometimes it's the North only, other times it's both North and South, and at times it's only the South. And then of course at numerous times it is commodius, and includes people entirely outside the North and South altogether, as in the 'sojourner'. On this last example, there is the matter of the 'catholicity' of Israel, and thus the inclusion of those who are not 'Israelite' but who are part of 'Israel' nonetheless by association (similar to the status of the others on the ark as "saved" because they were "with" Noah, or those whose blessing depends on their standing relative to Abraham)

His conclusion is that "to be 'Israel', canonically defined, was never only or even primarily about physical lineage, but by participation and association."

I don't feel adequate right now to fully stake a position on this issue. I'll just cite one of the starkest quotes on the issue that I am aware of by Brevard Childs, a scholar who has deeply impacted my way of understanding the Bible. The context is a conclusion concerning the theological implications of the canonical shape of Esther:

Perhaps the basic theological issue at stake in this disagreement has been more clearly formulated by R. Gordis: 'It is fundamental to the Jewish world-outlook that the preservation of the Jewish people is itself a religious obligation of the first magnitude' (Megillat, 13). In my judgment, Gordis' assertion holds true for Christian theology if kept within the critical guidelines which have been fixed by the canonical context of Esther.

On the one hand, the book of Esther provides the strongest canonical warrant in the whole Old Testament for the religious significance of the Jewish people in an ethnic sense. The inclusion of Esther within the Christian canon serves as a check against all attempts to spiritualize the concept of Israel - usually by misinterpreting Paul - and thus removing the ultimate scandal of biblical particularity. On the other hand, the canonical shape of of Esther has built into the fabric of the book a theological criticism of all forms of Jewish nationalism which occurs whenever 'Jewishness' is divorced from the sacred traditions which constitute the grounds of Israel's existence under God (Introduction to the Old Testament as Scripture, 606-607).

Biblical Scholarship and the State of Israel

Julia O'Brien, teacher at Lancaster Theological Seminary, has posted a short article on The Bible and Interpretation entitled "Biblical Scholarship and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict." Here are some of my thoughts as I try to process this issue, formulated in response to her key conclusions (O'Brien in Bold):

Combating anti-Judaism is necessary, important, and will continue to be part of my mission as a teacher. And yet, this trip has further convinced me that it is also my mission as a theological educator to challenge an uncritical identification of biblical Israel with the policies of the modern Israeli state.

How does she wish to do that? No one claims that modern Israel is simply Ancient Israel transposed into the present. Most people I know of say that the Jews stand in some kind of continuity with Israelites: biological, religious, and now geographical. But that's not the same thing as identifying Biblical and modern Israel. Working out the nature of the continuity is a complex issue that includes Biblical interpretation but also goes beyond it, drawing on the broader theological categories.

>The current situation is the product of empires and post-colonial responses to empire, not simply a divinely-decreed continuation of the conflict between Ishmael and Isaac.

This is a false dichotomy that doesn't exist in the Bible either. Wasn't Cyrus God's anointed?

>Just as my teaching underscores the difference between ancient and modern constructions of gender, sexuality, and economic justice, it also needs to establish a critical distance between past and present in terms of just distribution of land.

Creating "critical distance" , as I stated above, will make the work more irrelevant than relevant. In addition to that, simply highlighting a diversity of witness within the Bible doesn't solve the question of how these witnesses are to be brought into relation to each other nor how they are to function within the broader Jewish religious discourse. Judaism has developed its own categories for doing this, categories grounded in various theological convictions, and these can't be ignored by supposed ideologically neutral scholarship.

>And just as I point out the diversity of voices within the biblical text itself on matters of ritual, the purposes of partnership, and the will of God, I also need to draw greater attention to its diverse perspectives on the importance of land and of community homogeneity.

I should add that I'm not saying that this kind of work is not valuable or potentially enriching for debate about the issue. I'm doing this kind of thing myself! I just don't think that "Biblical scholarship," in its modern non-confessional guise, is sufficient for the task.

One final question: how diverse is the issue of the land in the Bible? It seems as central to OT theology as the covenant, torah, and the divine name.

Israel's contribution to the Euro-Vision song contest

I never got round to posting this on time. I'm not a fan of the Eurovision Song Contest - the music is just cheesy. But a friend sent me the link so I thought I'd share it here. I'm not sure where they finally came - 13th I think. The melody isn't up to much, but choice of language (Hebrew and Arabic, mainly) and the content of the main refrain ("there must be another way") are reasons enough for it to have won a vote from me.

A question just occurs to me: since when was Israel part of Europe?

Here's the website.

For another music video, on the same topic in the same languages, listen to In my heart.

Can the Pope Bring Peace to the Middle East?

John L. Allen Jr., the senior correspondent of The National Catholic Reporter, reckons that

If he plays his cards right, Benedict could move things forward in four ways.

Read his article in the New York Times to find out how.

I wonder what people think of this bit:

Historically, Arab Christians have promoted a pluralistic vision of society, standing between resurgent Islamic fundamentalism and ultranationalist strains in Judaism. If they disappear, prospects for peace become dimmer. The pope must assure these believers that global Christianity will not abandon them.

Palestinian murder - a bit of evidence

One often hears in the media of civilian Palestinians shot by Israeli soldiers. The army usually responds that the shooting was necessary. Anyone acquainted with this blog will know that I have a love for Israel, a love which no doubts makes me biased in my evaluations of what is going on (always inadequate, given that I am a thorough outsider). I try nevertheless to be objective, as when I posted my way through the invasion of Gaza. Below is a video clip (taken from here) that accompanied this report of a peaceful Palestinian demonstrator being shot in the West Bank. You can read the report and call it spin, but I find this video convincing and heart breaking.

Any (intelligent) responses out there?



[Hat Tip: Intern in Israel]

Israel's Catholic Jews

I've hardly posted of late due to time pressure. I hope to be posting more regularly in the future. In the meantime, a fascinating article from Haaretz on Israel's Catholic Jews. It raises the tricky question of Jewish identity (the law states Aliyah is denied to Jews who convert to other religions, whereas in reality it only applies to Christianity; see my post Why aren't messianic Jews Jewish?) and the relationships between church and synagogue (for a related post, see my The Judge of Church and Synagogue). I especially appreciated the biographical information. Here it is:

For Jerusalem's Hebrew-speaking Catholics, Jewish identity is cardinal

By Donald Snyder, The Forward

The traditional Jewish blessings over wine and bread, the Kiddush and the Motzi, echoed through the sanctuary at 10 HaRav Kook Street in Jerusalem. It was a room of striking simplicity - with just one small cross in brown wood.

Four Catholic priests wearing white robes and green stoles stood at the altar, as one of them recited these blessings. But unlike the blessings at a festive Jewish meal, these were blessings of consecration, transforming the bread and the wine into the body and blood of Christ. Just before taking Communion, church members exchanged the greetings of Pax Christi, Peace of Christ, saying to one another, "Shalom HaMashiach."

At the Church of Sts. Simeon & Anna, all the prayers are in Hebrew, as was this Evening Mass for the community known as the Hebrew-speaking Catholic community of Israel.
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This is not a messianic Christian gathering, but neither is it just another Catholic Church serving the country's 22,000 Roman Catholics, most of whom are Arab.

Active since 1955, the Hebrew-speaking Catholic Vicariate, also known as the Association of St. James, was founded mainly to serve European-Catholic immigrants to the new Jewish state - many of whom are married to Jews - shortly after its founding in 1948. With branches in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Haifa and Beersheba, the association is fully welcomed by the same society that bristles at the missionizing of Jews for Jesus. But in some ways, the backgrounds of several of its most prominent members are no less provocative.

They include strongly identified Jews - including several Holocaust survivors - who converted to Catholicism and view themselves as a philosemitic redoubt of advocacy for love of Jews and Israel within the church.

"We see ourselves rooted in Israeli society with a real respect for Jews as they see themselves, and we follow the Jewish liturgical calendar and observe many of their holidays, like Sukkot and Hanukkah," explained the Rev. David Mark Neuhaus, the vicar for the Hebrew Speaking Community in the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem. Neuhaus also gives lectures about Judaism and the Bible to Palestinian and Jordanian Arabs training for the priesthood at Beit Jala Seminary and Bethlehem University.

The primary objective of the Hebrew-speaking Catholic community, he explained, is to sharpen the church's awareness of its Jewish origins and the Jewish identity of Jesus and his apostles.

The association's population peaked at several thousand in the 1950s and '60s. Today it has about 400 members. Many left to get better Catholic educations for their children. But despite dwindling numbers, this Roman Catholic community shows a robust spiritual commitment.

Most of the immigrants come from mixed Catholic-Jewish marriages in which the wife is a practicing Catholic and the husband a non-observant Jew. Children of these mixed marriages are often raised as Catholics. Some of the original members were Jews who had been baptized to survive the Holocaust and wanted to remain Catholic after settling in Israel.

One of the early Jewish members of the Hebrew-speaking Catholic community was Brother Daniel, whose status as a Hebrew-speaking, Jewish-born Zionist Catholic priest created legal history in Israel when he sought citizenship there under the country's Law of Return, the statute guaranteeing citizenship on request to virtually all Jews who enter Israel.

Born Oswald Rufeisen into an Orthodox Jewish family in the Polish town of Oswiecim - known in Yiddish as Auschwitz - the future priest was a member of the Zionist Bnei Akiva youth group during his teenage years. Rufeisen fled Poland eastward when Germany invaded in 1939, but he ended up as a slave laborer for the Nazis in Lithuania. Escaping again, he used his language skills to obtain a false identity and employment as a translator for the police in the town of Mir in what is today Belarus. There, he is credited with having saved several hundred Jews by warning them of the Nazis' impending plan to liquidate the Mir ghetto and helping engineer their escape. He himself hid out for the remainder of the war in a local convent, during which time he decided to convert to Catholicism.

On his arrival in Israel in 1959, Rufeisen, by then a Carmelite monk, requested citizenship under the Law of Return. Amid great controversy, the government denied his application, narrowing the Law of Return to apply only to Jews who had not embraced another religion. Rufeisen's case went to the Supreme Court, which ruled 4-1 against the priest. Instead, Rufeisen became an Israeli citizen through naturalization, and lived there, a key member of the Hebrew-Catholic community?s Haifa branch, until his death in 1998.

Due to the Brother Daniel ruling, the Rev. Gregorcz Pawlowski did not even try to come to Israel under the Law of Return. Born Zvi Griner to an observant Jewish family, Pawlowski, now 78, was an 11-year-old boy in Zamosc, Poland, when the German army arrived and slaughtered his parents and his younger sisters. He managed to escape, and survived the war with a forged Catholic baptismal certificate, begging local peasants for food and shelter. He was near death from disease and starvation when the Russians drove the Germans from Poland in late 1944.

Pawlowski was placed in a Catholic orphanage, where he attended a school run by nuns. He became a priest after surviving the Holocaust. A longtime member of the Hebrew-speaking Catholic Vicariate, he also ministers to a Polish-Catholic community in Jaffa. Nevertheless, he plans to be buried in the Jewish cemetery in Izbica, Poland, where his mother and sisters were murdered. The slightly built, white-haired priest has asked Rabbi Michael Schudrich, Poland's chief rabbi, to recite the Kaddish, the Jewish prayer for the dead, at his funeral. He also fasts on Yom Kippur.

His simply furnished apartment at 4 Ben Zvi Street has two names on the door: Gregorcz Pawlowski in Latin letters, and beneath it, in Hebrew, Zvi Griner - two different names for a man of seemingly incompatible religious identities.

Speaking in Polish through an interpreter, Pawlowski told his story to this reporter in a monotone, his face expressionless. The trauma of his boyhood appeared to drain all emotion from his lengthy narration. He never smiled.

Neuhaus, the community's vicar, is a 46-year-old Jesuit priest raised as a Jew in South Africa. His path to Catholicism began when his parents sent him to study in a yeshiva in Jerusalem as a teenager.

Neuhaus told of how in Jerusalem, he met a Russian-Orthodox nun related to the family of the last tsar of Russia, Nicholas II. "I was 15, and she was 89," Neuhaus carefully explained. "She had an incredible influence over me from a spiritual standpoint. She radiated the presence of God. Her influence raised many spiritual questions about my faith."

Neuhaus promised his parents that he would discuss his religious direction with them and wait 10 years before making a final decision. He did as he promised, converting and becoming ordained at the age of 26.

"I attend a Reform synagogue regularly," said Neuhaus. "I go to the synagogue as an expression of who I am historically, socially and, to a certain extent, spiritually. The melodies of the synagogue are much closer to my heart than the chants in a Benedictine monastery, because I grew up with those melodies. Many of our members attend synagogue as an act of solidarity."

Neuhaus points out that Israel is the only society where Jews constitute a majority. The Jewish religion, history and culture establish the rhythm of life for the Catholic community, he said.

"For us, the universal Catholic reflection on the Jewish identity of Jesus and the Jewish roots of our faith is not just one element in our renewal after the Second Vatican Council," Neuhaus said in an interview with Zenit, the Catholic news service that covers the Vatican. "It is also part of our daily existence."

In an interview at the Pontifical Bible Institute, Neuhaus said that some members of the Hebrew-speaking Catholic community helped formulate the reforms of the Second Vatican Council, which repudiated charges of deicide against the Jews, denounced anti-Semitism and ruled that Mass may be offered in the vernacular. These reforms were contained in the founding charter of the Hebrew-speaking Catholic community 10 years before Vatican II convened, Neuhaus said.

Neuhaus views his community as one that led the way for Catholics to see Jews as brothers, not as evil people determined to subvert Christianity. Its members live according to the words spoken by Pope John Paul II when he visited the Great Synagogue of Rome on April 13, 1986: "You are our dear brothers or, we might say, our elder brothers."

Reconciliation in Israel/Palestine: a most beautiful video

This kind of stuff makes my heart burn within me. Check out the website of Musalaha.

John Hobbins has written some timely thoughts (timely to this post, of course) in Which side are you on in the Israeli-Arab conflict?

Check out this music video too by Israeli and Palestian musicians: In My Heart

Musalaha - an organization worth checking out

Musalaha is a non-profit organization that seeks to promote reconciliation between Israelis and Palestinians as demonstrated in the life and teaching of Jesus. We endeavor to be an encouragement and advocate of reconciliation, first among Palestinian and Israeli believers and then beyond to our respective communities. Musalaha also aims at facilitating bridge building among different segments of Israeli and Palestinian societies according to biblical reconciliation principles.

Do people know of other, similar organizations?

Update: They also have a new blog: Musalaha's Musings. Their posts are sporadic at the moment but they hope to change that. The first is an excerpt from the youth leadership training seminar for youth leaders in the West Bank. It emphasises the importance for youth leaders of practicing what they preach, as youth tend to justify their actions on the basis of those of their leaders. Palestine really does need decent leaders.

This makes me furious

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1074678.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/30/world/middleeast/30mideast.html?_r=1&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

Israel vilified?

Another video to add to the confusion about what is actually going on in Israel/Palestine:

I have to agree, however, that comparing Gaza to the Warsaw Ghetto is an example of extreme historical distortion that I can only describe as sick and irresponsible. Though feel free to contradict me (just use reasonable arguments!).

Outrage in the West Bank

Can somebody please justify this to me.


Watch CBS Videos Online

Jewish radicalism in the IDF

I posted a while back on Hamas, an organization which I consider to be terrorist and therefore illegitimate. The Palestinian journalist Laila links to an Israeli newspaper article in Ha'aretz detailing examples of Jewish extremism within the ranks of the IDF: IDF Rabbinate Publication during Gaza war. I'm no fan of the Baruch Goldsteins of this world. Nevertheless, the challenge - for me at least - is to critically evaluate the information within the context of the "big picture." The big picture, however, seems to be a fairly amorphous concept, as each particular construal involves assumptions that go beyond the "mere" facts on the ground.

Read Laila's post for excerpts. She has also posted a list of ideas for how to support the Palestinians practically and spiritually.

For a Christian organisation whith humanitarian links to Gaza, go to the Mennonite Central Committee website. One of the suggestions they make is to fast for the Palestians. I actually did that in the middle of the conflict, using the Lutheran version of the Liturgy of the Hours as a template. I didn't know what to say, so I prayed the Psalms and texts as if I were there (watching videos like this or this helped). My idea was to pray "vicariously," letting the Psalmist's "Lord open my lips, and I shall proclaim your praise" become potentially that of a Palestinian believer, the Psalmist's praise, lament, and supplication become that of those living in the midst of destruction. I don't know if such kinds of prayer "work" with God, i.e. lead him to strengthen his people, but they certainly opened the texts up for me in a completely new dimension.

[HT for the link goes to Halden. In fact, his latest post - Morally Based Political Action - speaks to my last comments on prayer. He says: " the most morally basic political action is prayer–or more comprehensively, doxology."

How can we bear this?

How can we bear this, in all the connotations of the Biblical word נשא?

I'm attempting to see both sides of the story. Jewish suffering in the modern Middle East, in the form of genocide and expulsion, is also a dimension of the overall picture that needs to be taken into account, as this 40 minute documentary shows.

[HT Laila for the video on Palestinian suffering; HT Point of no Return for the video on Jewish suffering].

A Gaza perspective

This is the title of an excellent interview with the fair-minded and eloquent Palestinian journalist Laila Ed-Hadded. I highly recommend you listen to it in order to hear a human and humane voice from within the current situation.

She also happens to be the author of the blog Diary of a Palestinian Mother. I take issue with some of her comments, inevitably, but in a situation like this, there isn't anyone with whom I wouldn't.

Israel and Gaza: some questions I'd like answered.

I've decided to post some of the main critiques made of Israel in its relations to Gaza by Avi Shlaim in his article How Israel brought Gaza to the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe. As I read it again I notice the rhetoric and a basic view of Hamas that I find naive. But then I'm hardly an expert on such matters. Nevertheless, he says much that is disturbing. Given the scope of the article, however, most of what is says is mere assertion. Though I love Israel, my love does not preclude my willingness to critique it. Yet, before I can do so, I need to get hold of the facts! And they are not easy to come by. If anyone has anything to say concerning the following points, or links to sources where I can get more information, I'd be grateful. Trying to figure out the situation is a full-time job, requring time that I unfortunately can hardly spare.

I've numbered the points for ease of reference:

1. The Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in the aftermath of the June 1967 war had very little to do with security and everything to do with territorial expansionism. The aim was to establish Greater Israel through permanent political, economic and military control over the Palestinian territories.

2. Gaza ... is not simply a case of economic under-development but a uniquely cruel case of deliberate de-development. ... The development of local industry was actively impeded so as to make it impossible for the Palestinians to end their subordination to Israel and to establish the economic underpinnings essential for real political independence.

3. In Gaza, the Jewish settlers numbered only 8,000 in 2005 compared with 1.4 million local residents. Yet the settlers controlled 25% of the territory, 40% of the arable land and the lion's share of the scarce water resources. Cheek by jowl with these foreign intruders, the majority of the local population lived in abject poverty and unimaginable misery. Eighty per cent of them still subsist on less than $2 a day.

4. In August 2005 ... Ariel Sharon staged a unilateral Israeli pullout from Gaza, withdrawing all 8,000 settlers and destroying the houses and farms they had left behind. ... To the world, Sharon presented the withdrawal from Gaza as a contribution to peace based on a two-state solution. But in the year after, another 12,000 Israelis settled on the West Bank, further reducing the scope for an independent Palestinian state.

5. The real purpose behind the move was to redraw unilaterally the borders of Greater Israel by incorporating the main settlement blocs on the West Bank to the state of Israel. Withdrawal from Gaza was thus not a prelude to a peace deal with the Palestinian Authority but a prelude to further Zionist expansion on the West Bank.

6. Israel's settlers were withdrawn but Israeli soldiers continued to control all access to the Gaza Strip by land, sea and air. Gaza was converted overnight into an open-air prison. From this point on, the Israeli air force enjoyed unrestricted freedom to drop bombs, to make sonic booms by flying low and breaking the sound barrier, and to terrorise the hapless inhabitants of this prison. [This seems to be confirmed by this documentary video].

[I should add that Kevin of biblicalia has kindly shared some thoughts on this article in the comment thread of my post, A hard pill to swallow.]

Mahmoud Darwish on Gaza

MAHMOUD DARWISH

"Gaza has no throat.
Its pores are the ones that speak in sweat, blood, and fires.
Hence the enemy hates it to death and fears it to criminality, and tries to sink it into the sea... And hence its relatives and friends love it with a coyness that amounts to jealousy and fear at times, because Gaza is the brutal lesson …and the shining example for enemies and friends alike. Gaza is not the most beautiful city.
Its shore is not bluer than the shores of Arab cities.
Its oranges are not the most beautiful in the Mediterranean basin.
Gaza is not the richest city.
It is not the most elegant or the biggest, but it equals the history of an entire homeland, because it is more ugly, impoverished, miserable, and vicious in the eyes of enemies.
Because it is the most capable, among us, of disturbing the enemy’s mood and his comfort. Because it is his nightmare. Because it is mined with oranges; children without a childhood; old men without old age; and women without desires. Because of all this it is the most beautiful, the purest and richest among us and the one most worthy of love."

For a song sung by an Israeli and Palestinian, with a few thoughts of my own, go to my post In my heart.

[Hat tip: Laila, of Raising Yousuf and Noor: diary of a Palestinian Mother]

Is this accurate? Is it fair?

I have always tended to be cynical of this kind of stuff. But then, how do I respond to this video?


Having said that, what about this video: "Hamas in their own voice"?


For another fascinating video on Hamas, made by an Arab, go to my post Who is Hamas?

[HT: Ksharif for comic; Facts of Israel for the second video]

A hard pill to swallow

is how I would describe my response so far to this war in Gaza. I tend to sympathize with Israel, but a fifty percent civilian death rate, in light of the fact that Israel itself has not always been as innocent as it claims, is too much for me. What do they expect after all this destruction? The result will be trauma, and trauma does not lead to the conditions of mutual trust necessary for any kind of agreement. I can't imagine what the future will look like after all this ... I know that Hamas are an "evil terrorist organisation" (to use a childish-sounding but true description, as these videos confirm), but Hamas are not the Palestinians and I can't help but wonder whether they voted for them in out of desparation with Israel's apparent lack of will to exchange land for peace ...

In order to form an opinion on this you need reliable information, and one theme of my posts over the last few days is that there doesn't seem to be any, or at least adequate criteria for judging. And not just reliable information, but also cultural and philosophical analyses to interpret what is going on (why did the Palestines dance with joy after 9/11, for example? What does that say about Israel's negotiation partner?). Nevertheless, the amount of information critical of Israel is overwhelming me at this point and I've not found too much to rebut it ... But then perhaps I haven't read enough.

The latest critical links come from a post by Roland Boer, the radical blogger at Stalin's Moustache, entitled Where have all the supporters gone? He links to a number of troubling articles on the rejection of Israeli action by Jews world wide. I struggle with some of their content (I cannot conceive how "genocide" is the best word to describe what is going on, it seems to me to be nothing of the sort; and when one article says that Hamas is "not a terrorist organisation" ... I'm sorry, but that article lost its credibility for me), but I also find myself looking around for some kind of justification of what's going on from the Israeli side. I need a response to each of the points that have been made, especially those in Avi Shlaim's article, which haunts me.

The latest troubling article is from Brian Hamilton of the blog Raids on the Unspeakable. The title says it all: Israel bans Arab parties from running in upcoming elections. Well, perhaps it doesn't. The fact that the motion is being taken to a high court, opposed as it is by other Israeli parties, and the fact that Arab parties exist at all, are, in my opinion, signs that Israel is not apartheid and not non-democratic.

But do feel free to contradict anything I say in the comments. In fact, I want you to. I'd just be grateful if you could provide evidence for your opinions.

Disclaimer: These are the relatively spontaneous thoughts of someone trying to follow a conflict in a foreign land, trying to find the time he has in an otherwise tight schedule. Nothing is absolute, and I welcome critique.

Update: I highly recommend you read the interesting and informative comment thread. In particular, Kevin, of the excellent blog biblicalia, has some eloquent statements of support for Israel in this current sitation (and in general), including a response to Avi Shlaim's Israel-critical article.

A blogger's view on the Gaza conflict

This blog has been such a blessing to me over the past year, as it's put me into contact with informed people from various spheres of life. I'm currently struggling to understand what is going on in Gaza. Kevin Edgecomb, author of the excellent blog biblicalia, has recently shared his views on the Gaza conflict, in response to my post A dialogue on the current Gaza invasion.I thought it was eloquent and interesting enough to deserve its own post. I'd also love to hear from others on this issue. Is Kevin right? Is he missing something? Are we all being brainwashed by the wrong media?

The shellings into Sderot began after Israel unilaterally decided to evacuate its settlements and end occupation of the Gaza Strip. This required the forced relocation of thousands of Israelis, and the end of profitable farms and orchards, to the detriment of the Gazans as well. This unilateral attempt at making peace has achieved nothing except putting Israeli communities in range of shelling from the Gaza strip. So, that was a stupid mistake. Relatedly, many of those families that were moved from the Gaza communities of Gush Katif and elsewhere have yet to be provided their government-promised new homes. This was a lose-lose situation for the Israelis all around. They have ruined the lives of thousands for nothing. Their attempts to make peace, following the suggestions bourgeois hand-wringers around the world, have failed repeatedly. Now, with Iranian Grad rockets having been smuggled into Gaza through the tunnels from Egypt, and these being used to extend the range of the attacks on Israel, the only response possible is the elimination of such a threat, through whatever means necessary. And, in keeping with international law, they are completely in the right, because of those continual mortar and rocket attacks over the last three years.

I've noticed another peculiarity in much of the coverage, calling Hamas' takeover of Gaza a coup. It was no such thing. They were elected by the majority of Palestinian voters to be the government of the Palestinians. (This should also give one pause, finding a populace with such a disgusting preference in representatives!) The Palestinian Authority (Abbas and the other "Tunisians"--the corruptocrats who followed Arafat around in his Tunisian exile and returned with him after the now-defunct Oslo Accords), however, was and is favored by the international powers, because they at least have the courtesy to lie to diplomats and pretend that they really want peace rather than the destruction of "the Zionist entity." PA/Fatah is no less culpable for suicide bombings and other terrorist attacks than Hamas is. (These, of course, were ceased not through any diplomatic skill, but through the construction by the Israelis of the security fence/wall, so that these terrorists couldn't just literally walk across the border to perpetrate their inhuman crimes.) But the PA now gets good press. It's just that diplomats prefer them for their diplomatic duplicity, and the news cycle (and apparently most of humanity) has a memory of approximately 24 hours.

So now in Gaza, we only have the two sides. One is Hamas, driven by a fanatical religious hatred of the Jews, their entire reason for existence being tied to the elimination of Jews. Number two, Israel, is the longest-lasting democracy and most vibrant economy in the entire region, which has been under assault by terrorists-cum-neighbors for the better part of forty years. And yet, this one little country is under so much more scrutiny than any other whenever it attempts necessary defense of its citizens, that they are required (and not only by outsiders, but by their own citizens) to jump through any number of nearly impossible hoops to effect that defense, and still they are cursed. Who has ever heard of phoning all the inhabitants of targeted buildings, telling them all to get out before they are bombed? It is extraordinary. It is also unnecessary. No other nation would ever have to do such a thing. And still, the outcry against Israel is vicious. It's pathetic. If this were fiction, I would throw it away as being completely unbelievable. And yet this is reality.

For a very different evaluation of the situation, see Avi Shlaim's article.