Israel, Zionism and the Media

Tag: bethlehem

The lies they tell at St.James’s Church, Piccadilly, London

This is a cross post from Barry Shaw’s The View From Israel

antiisraelwallYasser Arafat defied the Christian tradition in Bethlehem, which had been respected and upheld under Israeli authority, by appointing a Muslim governor and engineered a Muslim takeover of the city council. He then put his stamp on this town by converting the Greek Orthodox monastery, next to the Church of the Nativity, into his official Bethlehem residence.

At great risk to his life, Pastor Naim Khoury, of the Bethlehem Baptists Church, exposed the developing threats to Christians within the territories controlled by the Palestinian Authority. “People are always telling Christians to convert to Islam.”
His ministry is based on love and non-violence. He is also a strong advocate for Zionism based on God’s land covenant with Israel through Abraham.
Because of his views, his church has been bombed fourteen times, and he has been shot three times. He has been threatened by the Palestinian Authority to close the doors of his church which they consider as “illegitimate.”

This brave Christian priest needs and deserves the active support of church leaders worldwide. Instead, they boycott him and pick on Israel for their wrath, ignoring the human rights crimes of the Palestinian leadership whom they openly support. How twisted is that?

Elias Freij, the Christian mayor of Bethlehem at the time of the Oslo Accords in 1993, warned Israeli Prime Minister, Yizhak Rabin, to maintain control over his town. “Bethlehem will become a town of churches devoid of Christians if you transfer control to the Palestinian Authority.”
Israel caved in to international pressure, handed over Bethlehem to the Palestinian Authority and, for the middle class Christian residents, their lives became threatened, and the mayor’s warning became the current Christian nightmare.

The St. James’s Church Christmas charade failed to mention the fear that pervades the shrinking Christian population. The fear of attack by Muslim Palestinians is personified by Joseph Canawati whose sister, her husband, and three children have fled to America.
“I want to leave but nobody will buy my business. I feel trapped. We are isolated,” he complained.

But the Piccadilly church leaders turn a deaf ear to his plea, or to the fear of death at the hands of non-Christian Palestinians in Bethlehem, such as that felt by Jeriez Moussa Amaro whose two sisters, Rada aged 24 and Dunya aged 18, were gunned down by Palestinian Muslims in their own home. Their crime was to be young, attractive, and wear Western clothes and no veil.

Sami Qumsieh, the general manager of “The Nativity,” the only Christian television station in Bethlehem, has received death threats and visits from armed gunmen. He is now ready to leave.
“As Christians, we have no future here.”

How sad it is that this church, the British Methodist Church, and many other Christian leaders are blindsided in their pursuit of a perceived Jewish enemy that they fail to come to the rescue, or campaign for, their co-religionists, persecuted by those who they actively and expensively support.

Other related articles

http://www.thecommentator.com/article/4511/major_london_church_and_its_wall_for_terrorism

http://elderofziyon.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/the-bigotry-and-lies-of-st-james-church.html#.UsXgydJdWCM

http://cifwatch.com/2014/01/01/christmas-priorities-at-st-jamess-church-israel-security-wall-stunt-cost-30000/comment-page-1/

Is the synod EAPPI with this?

In response to the recent vote in the General Synod of the Church of England to support closer ties with EAPPI (Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel),  I was involved in writing this response on behalf of the Jewish Representative Council of Greater Manchester and Region which was subsequently sent to Christian magazines as an open letter:

The Jewish Representative Council  of Greater Manchester and Region  expresses  its great disappointment  at the result of  the vote in the General Synod to support EAPPI (the Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel).

Whereas it is perfectly legitimate for any Church or religious body to question or criticise the actions of the UK government or any foreign  government for that matter, as a question of conscience, it is alarming in the extreme to see the established Church of England support an organisation which itself associates with individuals and organisations whose motivation is not that of human rights or religious conscience, but of demonization and deligitimisation of the State of Israel.

This  was reflected in the tone and content of some of  the speeches made at the Synod. The debate at Synod  was littered with references to ‘powerful lobbies’, the money expended by the Jewish community, ‘Jewish sounding names’ and the actions of the community ‘bringing shame on the memory of victims of the Holocaust’.

This is deeply offensive and raises serious questions about the motivation of those behind the motion.

The content of the EAPPI website  itself is rife with uncontextualised allegations, witness and declaration whilst giving but lip service to balance, historical perspectives and disputed legalities.

The Church of England would do well, if not better, to concentrate its efforts, and lead on the parlous situation of Christian communities in the Palestinian Arab Territories and throughout the Middle East where they are subject to attack, abuse, dispossession, forced conversions, expulsion and murder not at the hands of Jews but of Muslims.

It should be noted that Israel is the only country in the Middle East whose Christian community is growing.

Our Council  which only last week joined in the celebrations connected with  the establishment  of the Council of Christians and Jews 70 years ago  will continue its interfaith work with the Church of England in Manchester with whom it has strong and highly valued ties; but this relationship has been severely damaged by this vote.

We especially thank the Bishop of Manchester Rt Revd Nigel McCulloch for his opposition to the motion and  for his deep understanding of the real issues.

I have emphasised the area under discussion but I believe this topic merits more than one blog post.

I read today in YnetNews

The Orthodox Christian Church in the Gaza Strip is claiming that a group of armed Islamists kidnapped five Christian Palestinians, a young man and a mother and her three daughters, to force them to convert to Islam.

In a statement, the church said that “the dangerous Islamist movement is trying to convince Christian men and women to convert to Islam, destroying Christian families and the Christian presence in the Gaza Strip.”

The church refused to divulge the name of the Islamist group it accused of these attempts.

The head of the Gaza church claimed that one of the Christians was abducted on Saturday after he had been heavily pressured to convert to Islam and had been prevented from seeing his family. According to the leader, the young man’s parents filed a police complaint, but the police did nothing after learning that the person behind the alleged kidnappers was a senior cleric identified with Hamas.

This reinforces my emphasised text above written before this story. All over the Arab world and within the Palestinian Authority Christians are under attack. In Bethlehem they are leaving or being forced out not by Israelis but by Muslims who intimidate them and appropriate property; in Egypt the Copts have been under attack. In Syria; in Iraq the Christian population is all but gone after centuries. Caroline Glick in the Jerusalem Post reviewed the situation last year.

So where is the EAPPI equivalent in these countries? Where are the Synod resolutions? What is the Church doing about it? Which governments are they protesting to? Which NGO’s have they set up to investigate?

As usual, it’s only Israel and the Jews who are subject to a level of scrutiny Israel alone in the Middle East would tolerate.

Meanwhile the in Israel the Christian community is the only one in the Middle East that is growing and the only one that feels safe and whose religious rights and practices are protected not just by law but in fact.

Eye-witness in Gaza (2) – The Christian pogrom in Bethlehem and other matters

Yesterday I wrote in (mostly) praise of Peter Hitchen’s recent MailOnline article about his visit to Gaza and the West Bank.

I covered his Gaza experiences, but his West Bank one is equally as enlightening.

Hitchens begins describing Arab hospitality but soon we find:

once again I saw the outline of a society, slowly forming amid the wreckage, in which a decent person might live, work, raise children and attempt to live a good life. But I also saw and heard distressing things

‘Wreckage’? Not sure what he means here. The last war here was 37 years ago. Many Arab towns in the West Bank look like anywhere else in the Middle East. Presumably this is a psychological wreckage in terms of almost 40 years of direct conflict with Israel.

At least we see civil society beginning to form, and about time too.

Hitchens is quick to see the plight of Christians under Palestinian Authority rule:

I feel all of us should be aware of … the plight of Christian Arabs under the rule of the Palestinian Authority. More than once I heard them say: ‘Life was better for us under Israeli rule.’

Ah! Interesting.

One young man, lamenting the refusal of the Muslim-dominated courts to help him in a property dispute with squatters, burst out: ‘We are so alone! All of us Christians feel so lonely in this country.’ Substitute ‘lonely’ with ‘hounded’ and persecuted’.

It appears it isn’t just Jews some Muslims are uncomfortable with. Whilst denying any Jewish connection to the Land of Israel, they now want to end 2,000 years of continuous Christian presence in the West Bank it appears. Will it be that a future Palestine is not just judenrein but christenrein as well.

This conversation took place about a mile from the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, where tourists are given the impression that the Christian religion is respected. Not really.

I was told, in whispers, of the unprintable desecration of this shrine by Palestinian gunmen when they seized the church in 2002 – ‘world opinion’ was exclusively directed against Israel. I will not name the people who told me these things.
I have also decided not to name another leading Christian Arab who told me of how his efforts to maintain Christian culture in the West Bank had met with official thuggery and intimidation.

There is no unsubstantial Christian presence in Bethlehem, as you might imagine. Hitchens tells us that it’s about 30,000 in the area but between 2001 and 2004 2,000 emigrated and if we assume that this migration will continue there may be no Christians at all in 10 to 15 years.

Arabs can oppress each other, without any help from outside. Because the Palestinian cause is a favourite among Western Leftists, they prefer not to notice that it is largely an aggressive Islamic cause.

Spot on, my man. This guy isn’t afraid to tell the truth.

Let’s digress here and look at the evidence for Christian persecution over many years. Let’s start with the Methodists current policy of a boycott of Israeli goods manufactured in the West Bank and their reason for it.

On their Conference website the most salient point for me is this:

The decision is a response to a call from a group of Palestinian Christians, a growing number of Jewish organisations, both inside Israel and worldwide, and the World Council of Churches. A majority of governments recognise the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories as illegitimate under international law.

I’m not going to get into the argument that the settlements are or are not illegal, what strikes me is ‘a call from a group of Palestinian Christians’. The fact that there are Israeli groups which favour boycotts is none of the Methodists’ business, but the Christians are.

Yet the Methodists are fixated on what Jews are purported to be doing to Christians but make no equivalent criticism or boycott of many egregious Muslim activities where Christians are being murdered or expelled or persecuted.

CiFwatch recently had a cross post from the Point of No Return website about the ‘inferior status of Christians under Islam’, in other words, dhimmitude.

The atrocity at Our Lady of Salvation in Baghdad in which 52 Christians were murdered has set off a flurry of articles about Christians under threat of extinction in the Middle East. Al-Qaeda has declared Arab Christians a legitimate target. Even Robert Fisk of The Independent is sounding the alarm about a flight of Christians of Biblical proportions – and that was before the massacre.

First the Saturday people – now the Sunday people. Jews have been virtually wiped out in Muslim lands.  Now it’s the turn of the ancient Christian communities.  Forty percent of the Assyrian Christian population of Iraq has fled since the fall of Saddam.

And much of this under the noses of the American coalition forces, presumably.

Also, in Syria:

since the late 1960s private Christian schools have been suppressed, …. the Armenian Christians of Syria are leaving at a particularly high rate: the government has banned their associations, publications, the teaching of their language and their political party.

Hmm. Seems like the Christian Arabs of the West Bank are not alone.

What about Jordan:

the monarch [sic] sees itself as the protector of the six percent of Jordan’s population who are Christians; they are given limited political rights. However, there is plenty of evidence that displaced Iraqi refugees view Jordan as a way-station to a third country of asylum – namely,the US. The refugees – and by no means all are Christian – complain bitterly that as non-residents they are not permitted to work or are paid exploitative wages. Only those with $100,000 to spare can obtain Jordanian residency rights.

Hmm. Seems the Christians in Jordan are worse off than those in the West Bank too.

Surely in Egypt, I want some good news:

It was the ‘secular’ regime under Gamal Abdul Nasser which did most to marginalise the Copts, now barely 10 percent of  Egypt’s population. They are not allowed to repair their churches without government permission, let alone build new ones. Ever since the 1950s, the Copts have  been persecuted, murdered, their women kidnapped and forcibly converted.  Copts have been leaving Egypt for decades.

Decades? Centuries, isn’t it?

New York, NY, November 16, 2010 … The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) today denounced the torching of at least 10 houses belonging to Coptic Christians in southern Egypt and called on Egyptian government officials to vigorously prosecute the perpetrators and increase protection for Copts. (http://www.adl.org/PresRele/IslME_62/5909_62.htm)

Hmm. So Egypt is also bad. So that’s Iraq, Syria, Jordan and Egypt. Lebanon, then, with its institutionalised power sharing between Muslim and Christian can be the only haven for Christians in the Middle East? Surely?

I found an excellent website: Christian Persecution Info. The Methodists should have a read:

Lebanese security forces prepared to crackdown on Islamic insurgents Friday, June 25, after threatening leaflets were found calling on Christians to leave a key port city, and a bomb blast that killed at least one person in a predominantly Christian town.

Officials said they already detained this week two suspects accused of distributing the threatening publications in the southern port city of Sidon. Those arrested where [sic] not immediately identified.

The leaflets included Islamic slogans and warned Christians in the area to “spare their lives by evacuating the area within one week” or “bear the consequences,” Lebanese media reported.

Underscoring the seriousness of the threats was a bomb blast last weekend that ripped through a car parts shop in eastern Lebanon, killing one person and injuring two others, an official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The explosion reportedly occurred shortly before midnight Saturday, June 19, in an industrial neighborhood of the predominantly Christian town of Zahle.

Now correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t it the current Israeli Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman, who is accused of wanting to drive out Arabs? Yet Israel seems to be the ONLY place in the area where Christians are free to worship without hindrance, are free from persecution.

You could accuse me of selective bias. OK, find me some negative stories about Christians being persecuted by the state in Israel.

I found a nice Italian site in English with the endearing headline ‘In Israel, Christians are Sprouting’. Conjures up an interesting picture, but we know what they mean.

Many of the members of indigenous communities, heirs of the ancient forms of Christianity that flourished there before the arrival of Islam, are fleeing.

The ones who remain live here and there in terror, for example in northern Iraq, in Mosul and the surrounding area, where in order to defend themselves they tend to make ghettos in the plain of Nineveh.

Ah, Iraq again.

And Israel?

The number of Christians within the borders of Israel has not been falling, but in absolute terms it has risen year after year: from 34,000 in 1949 to 150,000 in 2008, the last official figure.

One can speak only of a slight reduction in percentage terms – from 3 to 2 percent – because in the same span of time the number of Jewish citizens has grown from one million to 5.5 million, thanks to immigration from abroad, and the number of Muslims from 111,000 to 1.2 million.

Most of the Christians in Israel live in Galilee, while there are 15,000 of them in Jerusalem.

The exodus of Christians that has set off alarms therefore does not regard Israel, but rather the Holy Land, a geographically flexible term that extends to the Palestinian Territories and parts of the neighboring Arab countries, all the way to Turkey and Cyprus.

And for balance:

… there are the Palestinian Catholics who have been in Israel since its foundation, with the status of citizenship but in socially disadvantaged conditions.

Yes, maybe the Methodists would be better directing their efforts to helping the Arabs just like Jewish organisations:

LONDON – A new Jewish community initiative to promote understanding and equality for Israel’s Arab citizens is up and running with the announcement last week of its first coordinator.

The United Kingdom Task Force on Arab Citizens of Israel was set up last year by a broad coalition of Jewish organizations, to deepen UK Jewish engagement and understanding of issues facing Israeli Arabs and to leverage communal resources to provide effective solutions for furthering their rights.

Founding members of the initiative are the Board of Deputies of British Jews, United Jewish Israel Appeal, the Pears Foundation, the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland, the New Israel Fund and UK Friends of the Abraham Fund. The  task force’s executive committee is made up of the chairmen or chief executives of those organizations.

Task force members have highlighted the obligation set out in Jewish tradition and Israel’s Declaration of Independence to social and political equality for all the country’s inhabitants – Jews and Arabs alike.

Until a few years ago, there were just a few hundred Hebrew-speaking Catholics in Israel. But they are growing steadily, and today number at least seven communities: in Jerusalem, Jaffa, Be’er Sheva, Haifa, Tiberias, Latrun, and Nazareth.

But let’s move back to Peter Hitchens territory and look again at the plight of Christian Arabs in the Palestinian Authority controlled Bethlehem and see what Daniel Pipes was reporting in 2007:

a campaign of persecution against the Christians of the West Bank and Gaza has succeeded. “Even as the Christian population of Israel grows, that of the Palestinian Authority shrinks precipitously. Bethlehem and Nazareth, historic Christian towns for nearly two millennia, are now primarily Muslim.
Khaled Abu Toameh of the Jerusalem Post reports from Bethlehem, increased attacks by Muslims on Christian-owned property in recent months means that
some Christians are no longer afraid to talk about the ultra-sensitive issue. And they are talking openly about leaving the city. … According to the families, many Christians have long been afraid to complain in public about the campaign of “intimidation” for fear of retaliation by their Muslim neighbors and being branded “collaborators” with Israel. …

And in Hudson New York in May 2009, Khaled Abu Toameh again reported:

Christian families have long been complaining of intimidation and land theft by Muslims, especially those working for the Palestinian Authority.

Many Christians in Bethlehem and the nearby [Christian] towns of Bet Sahour and Bet Jalla have repeatedly complained that Muslims have been seizing their lands either by force or through forged documents.

In recent years, not only has the number of Christians continued to dwindle, but Bethlehem and its surroundings also became hotbeds for Hamas and Islamic Jihad supporters and members.

Moreover, several Christian women living in these areas have complained about verbal and sexual assaults by Muslim men.

Over the past few years, a number of Christian businessmen told me that they were forced to shut down their businesses because they could no longer afford to pay “protection” money to local Muslim gangs….

…..

On the eve of Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to the Holy Land, a Christian merchant told me jokingly: “The next time a pope comes to visit the Holy Land, he will have to bring his own priest with him pray in a church because most Christians would have left by then.”

Indeed, the number of Christians leaving Bethlehem and other towns and cities appears to be on the rise, according to representatives of the Christian community in Jerusalem.

Today, Christians in Bethlehem constitute less than 15% of the population. Five or six decades ago, the Christians living in the birthplace of Jesus made up more than 70% of the population.

Now there IS a cause for the Methodists who probably just care about this bit:

True, Israel’s security measures in the West Bank have made living conditions more difficult for all Palestinians, Christians and Muslims alike. But to say that these measures are the main and sole reason for the Christian exodus from the Holy Land is misleading.

If the security fence and the occupation were the main reason, the Palestinian territories should by have been empty of both Muslims and Christians. These measures, after all, do not distinguish between Christians and Muslims.

In fact, Christians began leaving the Holy Land long before Israel occupied the West Bank and Gaza Strip in 1967. But the number of those moving to the US and Canada has sharply increased ever since the Palestinian Authority took control over Bethlehem and other Palestinian villages and cities. When the second intifada erupted in September 2000, Christian leaders said they were “terrified” by the large number of Christians who were leaving the country.

Ironically, leaders of the Palestinian Christians are also to blame for the ongoing plight of their people because they refuse to see the reality as it is. And the reality is that many Christians feel insecure and intimidated because of what we Muslims are doing to them and not only because of the bad economy.

When they go on the record, these leaders always insist that Israel and the occupation are the only reason behind the plight of their constituents. They stubbornly refuse to admit that many Christians are being targeted by Muslims. By not talking openly about the problem, the Christian leaders are encouraging the perpetrators to continue their harassment and assaults against Christian families.

Gotcha! Gotcha, Methodists. You believe what you want to believe and blame the Jews, the Christ-killers and ignore the real persecution. For shame!

Let’s get back, once more, to Hitchens odd Odyssey across the West Bank where, Alice-like, he encounters some strange truths.

Hitch and the Wall (barrier, actually, for most of its length)

Think about this wall. I acknowledge that it is hateful and oppressive – dividing men from their land, and (in one case) cutting across the playground of a high school. But I have concluded that it is a civilised response to the suicide bombing that led to its being built.

Encountering Muslim anti-Semitism:

My host, a thoughtful family man who has spent years in Israeli prisons but is now sick of war, has been talking politics and history. His wife, though present, remains unseen.

Suddenly he begins to speak about the Jews. He utters thoughts that would not have been out of place in Hitler’s Germany. This is what he has been brought up to believe and what his children’s schools will pass on to them.

The heart sinks at this evidence of individual sense mixed up with evil and stupidity. It makes talk of a ‘New Middle East’ seem like twaddle. So, are we to despair? I am not so sure.

This is the demonisation that few neutrals and no anti-Zionists speak of, and if they do, they’ll tell you it is ‘understandable’.

Here Peter scrabbles to find a suitable end to his article, telling us about improving conditions, shops serving Arabs and Israelis and hoping the whole thing won’t end in a nuclear Holocaust.

Well done, Hitch. Not a perfect 10, but you made me think there is hope yet for the British Press.

Update: I noticed that Prof. Barry Rubin has written on this subject here.

Sheikh Tamimi’s hypocrisy, the Pope and the tightrope

Today Pope Benedict XVI arrived in Israel for a state visit which was always going to be fraught with opportunities to embarrass and be embarrassed; after all, His Holiness served in the Hitler Youth and the Wehrmacht, albeit briefly, albeit when he was very young and almost certainly against his will. Indeed, he actually deserted from the Wehrmact in the last days.

More recently he agreed to the rehabilitation of Levebrian priests including Bishop Richard Williamson, a British bishop who believes the Holocaust, one of the most documented events in human history, may have been exaggerated.

“I believe that the historical evidence is strongly against, is hugely against six million Jews having been deliberately gassed in gas chambers as a deliberate policy of Adolf Hitler”

 “I think that 200,000 to 300,000 Jews perished in Nazi concentration camps, but none of them in gas chambers”

This in an interview on Swedish television. Williamson, then went off to a dinner party with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and David Irving.

The Pope was also in hot water because, true to his conservative type, has issued a Motu Proprio authorising wider use of the Latin or Tridentine Mass that includes the Good Friday prayer for the conversion of the Jews.

If all this wasn’t enough, he has also begun the process of beatification of his predecessor pope Pius XII whom the Jews and many others believe did not do enough to protest the treatment of Europe’s Jews during the Holocaust and, although he dropped some strong hints, never actually publicly condemned the Nazis or the their anti-Semitic policies. In an effort to counter these claims the Vatican has, belatedly, published a number of documents showing how Pius XII, working behind the scenes, did much to help the Jews during this period. History may have to make some revisions with respect to the silence of Pius but it is unlikely to overturn history’s judgement.

So His Holiness arrives with three strikes already against him in his dealing with Jews and, therefore, the State of Israel. He had some serious fences to mend, banana skims to avoid and tightropes to walk.

With regard to Islam he wasn’t doing too well either having quoted the following:

Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.

Oh dear. Has anyone ever issued a fatwa against a Pope?

However, he was quoting from an obscure 14th century emperor, Manuel II Paleologus. I shan’t attempt to go into the deep theological content of this lecture, at Regensburg University in 2006, but suffice it say he upset a lot of Muslims. There was a clear lack of understanding of what a Pope should be saying about other religions even if he is quoting as part of a much wider discussion. He apologised afterwards but the genie was out of the bottle, as it were.

So it must have been with some trepidation that he set foot in the Holy Land, first visiting Jordan and today arriving in Israel where he found himself in Jerusalem at the Notre Dame Jerusalem Centre with Rabbi Shear Yashuv Cohen and Sheikh Taysir al Tamimi who is a cleric and also a jurist as well as been a fierce Palestinian patriot.

The Sheikh is on the board of OneVoice, whose website describes itself as: 

… an international mainstream grassroots movement with over 650,000 signatories in roughly equal numbers both in Israel and in Palestine, and 2,000 highly-trained youth leaders. It aims to amplify the voice of Israeli and Palestinian moderates, empowering them to seize back the agenda for conflict resolution and demand that their leaders achieve a two-state solution guaranteeing the end of occupation, establishing a viable independent Palestinian state, and ensuring the safety and security of the state of Israel – allowing both people to live in peace with all their neighbors. 

A noble cause indeed. Please note: “It aims to amplify the voice of Israeli and Palestinian moderates..”

One would assume, therefore, that its Board members would be moderates and always act and behave in the spirit of the organisation they represent, even if not doing so officially.

 

The purpose of the meeting of Jerusalem’s three faith communities at the Notre Dame Centre was “inter-religious dialogue”, something, no doubt, that OneVoice would support.

In an unscheduled speech the Sheikh, board member of OneVoice, certainly took the opportunity to have his voice amplified. Speaking in Arabic, according to the Jerusalem Post:

accused Israel of murdering women and children in Gaza and making Palestinians refugees, and declared Jerusalem the eternal Palestinian capital. 

Fine. The  Sheikh is entitled to air his views but it was certainly not in the spirit of the meeting or likely to further the causes of peace. 

The Pope shook his hand and walked out thus neatly ending his first high-wire sortie. His Press Officer, Father Federico Lombardi, then provided the safety net:

L’intevento dello sceicco Tayssir Attamimi non era previsto dagli organizzatori dell’incontro. In un evento dedicato al dialogo, tale intervento è stato una negazione del dialogo. Ci si augura che questo incidente non comprometta la missione del Papa diretta a promuovere la pace e il dialogo tra le religioni, come egli ha chiaramente affermato in molti discorsi  di questo viaggio. Ci si augura anche  che il dialogo interreligioso nella Terra Santa non venga compromesso da questo incidente.

(The intervention of Sheikh Tayssir Attamimi was not scheduled by the organizers of the meeting. In a meeting dedicated to dialogue this intervention was a direct negation of what a dialogue should be. We hope that such an incident will not damage the mission of the Pope aiming at promoting peace and also interreligious dialogue, as he has clearly affirmed in many occasions during this pilgrimage. We hope also that interreligious dialogue in the Holy Land will not be compromised by this incident.)

The Pope was clearly embarrassed by this but his reaction was dignified and appropriate. The Sheikh’s behaviour, whatever his conviction, was an insult to the Pope and opportunistic.

The Sheikh has form. He did a similar thing in the same place when Pope John Paul II visited in 2000. You would have thought they would be forewarned, but they could hardly not invite him. On that occasion the Sheikh was decidedly not speaking in the spirit of OneVoice as the JP points out:

Never referring to Israel by name, Tamimi had called on “the occupier” to stop “strangling Jerusalem and oppressing its residents.”

Singling out land confiscations, house demolitions, settlements and the Baruch Goldstein shooting in 1994, Tamimi said that Israel had a long record of “genocide” and “shooting and wounding Palestinian children.”

 This is verging on the rhetoric of Hamas with its lies about genocide and targeting of children.

But here’s the hypocrisy bit. Whilst Jews, Christians and Muslims, and indeed all religions, are allowed freedom of religious practice and access to their holy places in Israel, in Bethlehem, for example, which is under Palestinian Authority control, Christians, one time the majority, are being driven out by religious intolerance from Muslims.

In this JP article two years ago: 

A number of Christian families have finally decided to break their silence and talk openly about what they describe as Muslim persecution of the Christian minority in this city. 

The move comes as a result of increased attacks on Christians by Muslims over the past few months. The families said they wrote letters to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, the Vatican, Church leaders and European governments complaining about the attacks, but their appeals have fallen on deaf ears. 

According to the families, many Christians have long been afraid to complain in public about the campaign of “intimidation” for fear of retaliation by their Muslim neighbors and being branded “collaborators” with Israel. 

But following an increase in attacks on Christian-owned property in the city over the past few months, some Christians are no longer afraid to talk about the ultra-sensitive issue. And they are talking openly about leaving the city. 

But Arab propaganda says otherwise and blames, you guessed it, the Israelis. Here’s Al Jazeera:

Bethlehem’s mayor explains that the worsening conditions under the Israeli occupation are the main reasons for the “Christian exodus”.

Victor Batarseh says that the Christians are leaving because of the stress of occupation, the lack of jobs and worsening economic situation in the territories, the constant fear of war and military incursions and the continuous building of roadblocks and the wall.

“It is much easier for a Christian Palestinian to get a visa to a Western country than a Muslim Palestinian,” Batarseh said.

“So because it is easier they are able to leave.”

Yeah right. The Muslim Palestinians really find it hard to get to the West. According to Abbas Shiblak, The Palestinian Diaspora in Europe: Challenges of Dual Identity and Adaptation, (ISBN 9950-315-04-2) more than 10,000 Palestinians arrived in Britain alone in the 1990’s. It records, as of 2001, 191,000 Palestinians resident in Europe. 

Sadly, but predictably, most commentators take the Al Jazeera line, even the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, who just concedes that the plight of Christians is a result of occupation whilst ignoring the fact that Bethlehem is behind a barrier because 50 percent of all suicide bombers came from Bethlehem.

So when the Pope visits the remnants of the Christian community under the PA rule he might wish to take some of its leaders aside and ask them discreetly why Christians thrive in Israel free of persecution and intimidation but are frightened to speak under Muslim control in the West Bank and Gaza as their numbers dwindle.

For Sheikh Tamimi, board member of OneVoice, I would point out that it rubs both ways; you can’t just choose which “ethnic cleanser” to criticise, especially when your lot are at it big time. See for example this article in the JP in June 2007:

Christians living in Gaza City on Monday appealed to the international community to protect them against increased attacks by Muslim extremists. Many Christians said they were prepared to leave the Gaza Strip as soon as the border crossings are reopened.

The appeal came following a series of attacks on a Christian school and church in Gaza City over the past few days.

Father Manuel Musalam, leader of the small Latin community in the Gaza Strip, said masked gunmen torched and looted the Rosary Sisters School and the Latin Church.

“The masked gunmen used rocket-propelled grenades to storm the main entrances of the school and church,” he said. “Then they destroyed almost everything inside, including the Cross, the Holy Book, computers and other equipment.”

Musalam expressed outrage over the burning of copies of the Bible, noting that the gunmen destroyed all the Crosses inside the church and school. “Those who did these awful things have no respect for Christian-Muslim relations,” he said. 

There’s a pattern here somewhere. Oh yes. If Muslims persecute Christians, the Church says nothing. If Jews are in conflict with Muslims then EVERYONE feels free to have a go and condemn the Jews.

Inconsistency and hypocrisy is often (but not always) the currency of Israel’s detractors.

Meanwhile, His Holiness is preparing for his next hire-wire act.