THE WORLD Needs PEACE

By Noralyn Dudt

NOW

IN Gaza, 2 million people are jammed into an area about the size of Las Vegas. Medical supplies,  food, water and fuel are dwindling. Israel's continued airstrikes have forced hundreds of thousands of Gazans from their homes deepening the humanitarian crisis there.

A blast killed hundreds at a hospital in Gaza. They were civilians who were sheltering there thinking that a hospital would never be hit. The hospital explosion compounded the escalating humanitarian crisis in the Gaza Strip. Even before the blast, rescuers were struggling to free more than a thousand people trapped under the rubble, and fights were breaking out over loaves of bread. The situation in Gaza is a disaster in the truest sense of the word: "massacres everywhere,"  said a paramedic with the Palestinian Red Crescent. The streets reek of death. And then...a bomb hit an ancient Christian church where families with young children were taking refuge. The bombing of a church strikes everyone as "abnormal." A sad but immutable fact in an unresolved, unending conflict. In the bombings during World War 2, the Allies took great care not to target churches, temples or any other iconic structures.

 

THEN

"As Jesus walked to his crucifixion, carrying His cross, women followed him, wailing and lamenting. He turned to them and said, "Daughters of Jerusalem, do not weep for me, but weep for yourselves and for your children." (Luke 23:28)

It was a foreshadow of the suffering that would follow the siege of Jerusalem in AD 70 at the end of the First Jewish-Roman War. It marked the beginning of a long diaspora for the Jewish people. They fled their homeland and ended up living in places throughout the then Roman Empire.

The Ottoman Empire ruled Jerusalem and much of the Middle East about 1516 to 1917. After World War 1, Great Britain took over Jerusalem, which was then part of Palestine. The British controlled the city and surrounding region until Israel became an independent state in 1948. Under the British Mandate ( 1920-1948), the whole region was known as Palestine. While the State of Israel was established on the 15th of  May 1948 and admitted to the United Nations,  a Palestinian state was not established. The remaining territories of pre-1948 Palestine,  the West Bank—including East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip, were administered from 1948 till 1967 by Jordan and Egypt,  respectively.

In 1948, the Disraeli Declaration of Independence sparked the Arab-Israeli War, which resulted in the 1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight—around 700,000 of them were expelled from what is now Israel, a displacement that has been a major theme of Palestinian history. Palestinians refer to the event as "nakba" which means "catastrophe" in Arabic. It was a displacement that subsequently led to waves of Jewish emigration from other parts of the Middle East and Europe.  Today,  approximately 43 % of the global Jewish population resides in Israel. A large number have been living in the United States for two or three generations, but many have moved to Israel to establish kibbutzes.

After the war in 1967,  Israel gained territorial control over the Sinai peninsula and Gaza Strip from Egypt; the West Bank and East Jerusalem from Jordan; and the Golan Heights from Syria.

 

THEN & NOW

ISRAEL asserted that her people need to feel safe. To assure them of this sense of "safety," all entry and exit points of every Palestinian village,  town and city in the occupied West Bank are controlled by the Israeli Occupation Forces. Palestinians, unlike the Israeli settlers who have moved into Palestinian lands, have no freedom of movement.  Remaining in historic Palestine are the vast majority of the Palestinian population under the age of 17. News agencies describe them as having been born in an  "open prison" and have only known prison. Gaza is completely sealed off from the rest of the world by Israel's apartheid wall and subjected to debilitating siege—an 'ideal' place for Hamas to recruit the youth who must feel and think that they have no future. The populace is subjected to "search-and-arrest warrants on a regular basis.

These are just a few facts that could provide answers to those of us in the international community who remain puzzled by the violence and undying hatred. There's a physical battle and as horrible as it is,  the  "battle of the narratives" ( information)  can be just as horrifying and misleading.

Historical contexts have been left out, compounding the problem.

 

HERE, THERE, & EVERYWHERE

In normal times, we normally like to agree to disagree on all manner of things. But with a bleak and bloody war unfolding, these are not normal times. Mere weeks before the Hamas  surprise attacks, experts were marveling at how quiet things seemed in the Middle East. If only they had stayed that way, we say. Consumed by rage, both Israel and Palestine have been pulled toward darkness, yet again. The international community, without bias, needs to help both sides scratch and pull their way back toward the light.

Just a week ago, US President Joe Biden plans to call on the  U.S. Congress to approve tens of billions of dollars in military aid for Israel (in the same package for Ukraine). At the same time, he's promising  $100 million to Gaza for humanitarian aid. It doesn't take much imagination to see the irony;  weapons for one side and band-aids for the other. How can this huge disparity ( dollar amount for weapons vis a vis humanitarian aid ) be explained?

The international community has been listening to the Israelis and rightly so. But  it should  start listening to the Gazans as well.  What are their hopes and aspirations? Is Hamas really working for their best interests?  Why is there so much hatred?  How can Israeli security be assured without Palestinians being made second-class citizens? And shouldn't the Palestinians be assured of their security as well? Would concrete gestures of hope extended to Palestinian youth alleviate the feeling of hopelessness—hopelessness that can often lead to violence?

Israel was established as a state, admitted to the United Nations but Palestine was not. Palestinians are walled in a small strip of land where animosity and hatred naturally developed. Hamas breaches the apartheid Wall, throws rockets, kill and kidnap Israelis.  Israel strikes back in full force. A hospital and a church where families are taking refuge have been bombed. It's an endless, vicious cycle. An "eye for an eye" and a "tooth for a tooth." No peace can be achieved  that way.

The former U.S. President Jimmy Carter in his best-seller book wrote "Peace, not Apartheid." May it be so.

 

THEN

"As JESUS came near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, "If you, even you, had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes."(Luke 19:41-42)

"O Jerusalem,  Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it ! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing."(Luke 13:34)

Jesus wept....should we weep as well?

Dear Lord,  you heard our prayers.

And Now, please talk to us...again...and again.

May those ancient olive groves where You once prayed and sweat drops of blood before your arrest and crucifixion, be shared by both peoples...for peace in our world.

Peace on Earth, Goodwill toward humankind... Amen.

 

Noralyn Onto Dudt has met both Israelis and Palestinians in the international enclave where she has been living in the past 51 years.