Price tag attack on J’lem church provokes religious condemnation.
Here is in excerpt from my latest article co-authored with Aziz Abu Sarah.
…So now we have Christian funds from the United States that have effectively supported the misguided second and third generation settler youth who are actively attacking churches and referring to Jesus as a son of a whore. If this is what Pastor John Hagee and other radical Christians intended, then it suggests a rather bizarre theology of interfaith love and care. It seems in reality that these funds are intended to foment conflict, to promote a confrontational, apocalyptic and messianic end to the State of Israel….
This expresses some of my feelings since returning from Syria. More poems by Huda can be found here.
The Peacemakers
by Huda Orfali
Friday, September 15, 2006
Dedicated to His Holiness Pope John Paul II and the Grand mufti of Syria Sheikh Ahmad Hasoun
The Peacemakers
Collaboration by Peter Paton and Huda Orfali
As the religious divide grows
In the troubled world
They call for dialogue and harmony
In a country where prayers are heard
From two divine neighbors
The church and the mosque
They echo one another
In one call for love
In the world of Islam
He is a shining light
Who teaches tolerance
And unconditional love for all
A spiritual leader
Of great
…
Christiane Marie Sarah writes on Jewcy about the complexity of the Christian Jewish Relations and the importance of new ways of engagement:
Jerusalem was busy last week as thousands descended on the city for Sukkot and the annual Jerusalem March. This year’s march drew around 70,000 people, up from the 35,000 who participated in 2008. 20,000 police stood by on Tuesday to oversee the controversial event, after what has already been a tense week in Jerusalem. Thousands of Christians also took part in the march, attending as part of a Feast of Tabernacles celebration hosted by the International Christian Embassy of Jerusalem (ICEJ).
Christian presence is a by now a familiar part of the Sukkot…
Written by Aziz Abu Sarah
“Netanyahu and Lieberman are asking the world to recognize Israel as a Jewish state – I say uphold Jewish values! After all, it was Habakkuk the Jewish prophet who said ‘Woe to him who builds a city with bloodshed and establishes a town by crime!’”, notes Aziz Abu Sarah. (Read the complete article on Middle East Online.)
The Palestinians who have lost their homes, on the other hand, have not been able to rally enough people to draw constant, vehement support. Fatah, Hamas, and the PLO are too busy with their own conflicts to be of any real help to the Palestinians in Jerusalem, and the international community…
By Kobi Skolnick
In the last few weeks, there have been many developments in the Middle East conflict. People around the world have been following the speeches of President Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu, as well as Hosni Mubarak’s essay in the Wall Street Journal. This high-level discussion signals a shift in policy and progress toward peace. However, some skeptics wonder if this is just another phase in a cycle of false hope. After all, it is not difficult to imagine another suicide bombing in one of Israel’s cities, or an ill-timed Israeli Defense Force operation in the Palestinian Territories, both of which would immediately make peace look like a mere fantasy.
This danger has always existed…
I spent almost an hour on the phone with this excellent reporter, Manya A. Brachear, who wrote the Los Angeles Times story. The more I studied the pictures the more horrified I became that this man was running the United States military, and that our country was actually engaged in a Christian crusade in the eyes of so many of its soldiers. I am so glad the reporter gathered the responses of the Christian community and I do hope that, as I said in the article, there is a bipartisan Christian effort to put this dark period behind us in the United States.
Here is an excerpt:
One passage plucked from the New Testament’s
…
A curious animosity has arisen on several sides of the Pope’s visit to Israel. Israeli Members of Parliament as well as very prominent rabbis took every opportunity to snipe at every word the Pope did say, should have not said, or should have said. As I watched the media blitz unfold I was amazed at the acrimony. Roi Ben Yehuda, however, has a positive essay on the Pope’s visit and the potential role of peacemaking for religious leaders. Also, various rabbis of the United States and the world were far more generous in welcoming the Pope to Israel.
I understand policy differences with the Pope. Most of the world has one…
This article just appeared in Today’s Zaman and in Zaman which is Turkey’s preeminent journal. As you can see this has been part of my ongoing efforts to introduce and encourage far more intermediaries in the Middle Eastern conflict who can be effective, trustworthy and more even handed that Western intervention. This is meant also to encourage the United States, Hilary Clinton, and others to follow the lead of where the most moderate voices of the Islamic world are going. This is also a development of my work in Syria which has encouraged cultural revival that is peace-oriented, practical and visionary at once.
Turkey’s return to glory
by
Marc Gopin
For reasons of
…
Sometimes in the construction of a better world, it is necessary to go into the heart of darkness, to quote Conrad. Sometimes it is only in exploring our heart of darkness that we can figure out where we are, so that we know how to get beyond our current fallen state. I am drunk with blood these days, thoughts of blood, fear of blood, the rage of boiling blood, and so is anyone for whom Palestine and Israel are a fixation.
This report of carnage in a Gaza hospital in all its horrifying details is typical of the innocents who are being cut to pieces.…
