|
|
THE ROLE OF THE
CHURCHES ON THE HOLY LAND
They also appear to have the ear of President George W. Bush and his policy-makers. As far as they are concerned, what happened in 1948 and since are part of God’s intention that the Children of Israel be gathered to Jerusalem and its surroundings. It will speed up the Second Coming of Christ. Rather than concentrate on Jesus’ exhortations during his First Coming to feed the hungry, heal the lame, give sight to the blind, clothe the naked, free the prisoners, etc. such people are happier waiting for the Second Coming. Meanwhile they support a regime that specialises in making the poor poorer, in making those with perfect sight blind, in making the walking lame, etc. That Palestine was already occupied by Arabs, who would have to be driven out to fulfil the ‘ethnic-cleansing’ intentions of Political Zionism, is no cause for any moral distress for such people. Why? Because of the way they interpret some of the prophetic and apocalyptic biblical texts. Their interpretation is not only naïve but is fundamentally immoral. A god such as theirs is the Great Ethnic-Cleanser, a militaristic and xenophobic genocidist, who is not sufficiently moral even to conform to the requirements of the Fourth Geneva Convention, or any of the Human Rights Protocols which attempt to set limits to barbarism. The grotesque views of such people, embracing an essentially ethnic-cleansing enterprise as a fulfilment of biblical prophecy, and clothing Political Zionism in the garment of piety, would not warrant serious attention were it not for the influence they have on the domestic and foreign politics of the USA. 2. Neither has the performance of the mainstream Churches been a model of ethical engagement. It is one of the anomalies of recent Church history that while Christians have supported oppressed peoples virtually everywhere else, there has been relatively little protest against the historic injustice perpetrated on the indigenous population of Palestine by Political Zionism, a movement thoroughly at home in the colonial spirit of nineteenth-century Europe. Many Christians, of course, are sympathetic to the ideal of a state for Jews as compensation for the litany of European persecutions of Jews. That it is others who have to pay is all the better. Even when faced with compelling evidence about the damage done to the Palestinians these people remain rather detached. They really can’t bring themselves to face into the dark side of Political Zionism. In any case, taking a stand for Palestinian rights is not likely to help one’s promotion prospects, either in the Church or in the Universities. 3. There are, of course, many Christians who approach the question of Palestine from a Human Rights perspective. They acknowledge the fundamental injustice done in 1948, and the atrocities associated with the occupation. Such people are not in positions of power within the Churches. The most the leaders of the Churches, by and large, appear able to bring themselves to is to subscribe to the ‘fallacy of balance’. The conscience of the Church leadership is virtually paralysed by guilt, mostly about what was done to Jews in Europe in the past, for which they themselves are hardly responsible. Such is their guilt also that they leave unchallenged a Zionist reading of Jewish history and of recent events in Palestine. They offer no critique of the ideology of Political Zionism commensurate with that of apartheid, for example, an ideology of far less rious consequences than Zionism. To add to the Church’s neglect, the evidence is abundant that the damage done to the indigenous population of Palestine was neither accidental nor due to the unique pressures of war, but was at the heart of the Zionist enterprise from the beginning. Yet, the Churches reflect little appetite to pursue these issues of justice and respect for historical truth. The Churches, then, are faced with a major moral challenge. They should give a lead in moral debate, rather than fall into line with ongoing political manoeuvres, which in conforming with the demands of the powerful, reflect little contact with recognisable moral principles. For religious bodies in any way to accord legitimacy to the expulsion of an indigenous population, and the appropriation of their lands is highly problematic. For a start, the leaderships of the Christian Churches should be prepared to insist that Israel come clean on its seminal injustice against the Palestinian Arabs and apologise for it, undo the damage it has perpetrated as far as that is possible, honour its obligations with respect to the Palestinian right of return, make appropriate compensation for the damage done, and, on the basis of confession and restitution, move towards a less ethnocratic polity. Such
exhortations would flow effortlessly from principles of Christian morality, and
would be in conformity with elementary justice. What we get instead is the
embrace of whatever proposal—the Oslo Accords, the ‘Road Map’—however
jaded, and however lacking in principles of justice, the asymmetric parties to
the dispute contrive, as though the Christian Church were content to act on the
novel moral principle that the rights of the perpetrators of injustice and its
victims are finely balanced. Michael Prior, C.M., Senior Research Fellow in Holy
Land Studies, St Marys College, Strawberry Hill (University of Surrey), is the
author of The Bible and Colonialism: A Moral Critique (Sheffield 1997), Zionism
and the State of Israel: A Moral Inquiry (Routledge 1999), and is editor of Holy
Land Studies. A Multidisciplinary Journal (Continuum, 2002-). |
All written word is "The Opinion" of Thomas A. unless otherwise noted...
Check out this crazy site!! passionbarn.com You would not believe what is on the internet Other Links on this strange ancient beast BarnyardModels FarmFlics Filthy Farm
|
