News, articles and documents from
the Holy Land
Issue No. 149 - Saturday, 27 April 2002
Dear Friends, Brothers and Sisters,
Last Thursday
our Patriarch accompanied the convoy of humanitarian aid to Jenin and it’s camp
which is prepared by the joint Christian relief agencies in Jerusalem. This is
the forth convoy after the one of Bethlehem, Tulkarem and Nablous. It was
really a very touching experience to visit the city and the camp and see and
touch the brutality of man against his brother. My own conclusion was that we
are losing our humanity in this bloody war of destruction lead by a whole army against
civilian population who’s militants are defending their right for freedom and
independence. I don’t justify the Palestinian violence, but I cannot also but condemn
the Israeli Barbary in destroying a whole camp where used to live 15.000 people
who are now became homeless and refugees for the third time. What happened in
Jenin camp is simply morally unacceptable and unjustified. You cannot even believe
that “a democratic state with the most moral army in the world” as Mr. Katsav
said lately, committed such a war crimes in front of the world. I am sure that
they did worst than an earthquake can do, this is the least that we can say.
What a shame!
Yesterday, a prayer was held at St. Anne’s Church during which Men and women Religious of the Holy Land have written a message for Ariel Sharon and Yasser Arafat calling for an end to war and the endless chain of violence. With regard to the two peoples, Israelis and Palestinians, the Religious say: "we see no other solution than sharing and collaboration". The message was released in Jerusalem at the Church of Saint Anne where there will be an interreligious assembly, attended by Nuncio Archbishop Pietro Sambi, Latin Patriarch Michel Sabbah as well as Rabbis and Muslim leaders. After this the Christians will pray the Stations of the Cross along the Via Dolorosa (due to different calendars, the Eastern Churches are still in the Season of Lent). You can find herewith the English text of the message (You find a French, Italian, Spanish, German and Arabic translation published in my homepage http://go.to/nonviolence ).
Tomorrow the
Patriarch will celebrate the Oriental Palm Sunday in our Parish in Ramallah
after the partial end of the occupation of the city which lasted more than four
weeks. People will be able to go to Sunday mass for the first time and begin
the holy week in this atmosphere of fear amidst the war and destruction. While
in Bethlehem area for the forth consecutive Sunday people will not be able to attend
mass especially in the Nativity Church which is still under strict siege. It
seems that the negotiation didn’t give yet any fruits, which means that the
siege of the Church and the whole Bethlehem area will enter its forth week and approach
one month.. It is really incredible and unacceptable, because this has never happened
anywhere in the world and during the whole history of mankind... This is the
Israeli democracy!
You will find in
today’s Olive Branch several articles and documents:
1)
A Letter from
Archbishop of Constantinople Bartholomew addressed to our Patriarch.
2)
A Message of Men
and Women Religious in the Holy Land to the Political Leadership in Israel and
Palestine.
3)
Interview with
Archbishop Tauran, Secretary for Relations with States concerning the Vatican´s
Position Vis-ŕ-vis the Holy Land.
4)
Cardinal
Archbishop of Westminster CORMAC MURPHY-O’CONNOR writes to The Independent – 24th
April 2002 – concerning Bethlehem siege and humanitarian principles.
5)
Toine van
Teeffelen writes in his Letter from Bethlehem (23) about daily life in
Bethlehem under curfew.
6)
The real aim of
“Operation Defensive Shield” was not to “destroy the infrastructure of
terrorism” writes Uri Avneri. What was then the real aim?
7)
“Occupation
in process” written by: Ghassan Andoni from rapprochement center in Beit Sahour.
8)
A short prayer for peace that you can pray for us and with
us.
I think that we don’t have any more weapon in front what is going on in
this land but the weapon of the prayer… It is only God who can save us and
grant us his peace, because men don’t know the ways of peace they only know the
ways of war, unfortunately!
Please pray
for us and with us in order to end the painful Calvary of the Holy Land
Best wishes from Jerusalem & Bethlehem Fr. Raed Abusahlia
Letter from Archbishop
of Constantinople Bartholomew
Your Beatitude
Patriarch Michel Sabbah of the Latins in Jerusalem, our Modesty's beloved
brother in Christ, we fraternally embrace you in the Lord.
With deep sorrow
and distress, we express our wholehearted sympathy to You and Your faithful
during this time of crisis in the Holy Land. It deeply pains us to witness the senseless killing that is
occurring among peoples of different faiths who live together in this region,
and to witness the unnecessary desecration of Christian holy sites in this
land. It further saddens us to know that You and Your people must suffer and
endure the consequences of this inhumane and incomprehensible behavior.
We pray that our
Almighty God and Lord Jesus Christ, present with us always, will continue to be
a source of strength and inspiration as You shepard Your flock during this time
of conflict, and that He bring comfort to those who are mourning in Your
community.
We also pray for
the enlightened leadership of this region to bring about an abrupt end to this
unrest in order to make God's desire for good will and mutual understanding
between individuals, nations and faiths prevail in this land, which is central
and holy to millions of God-fearing people throughout the world.
Your Beatitude’s
Beloved Brother in Christ
+ Bartholomew
Archbishop of Constantinople
New Rome and
Ecumenical Patriarch
A Message of Men and Women Religious in the Holy Land
to the Political Leadership in Israel and Palestine
« Pray
for peace in Jerusalem » (Ps 122,6)
It is our love for this Land and its two
peoples that motivates us, men and women religious of the Holy Land, Arabic and
Hebrew speakers as well as expatriates, to humbly address this letter to you. We
live within the local Christian community that has been in this Land since the
beginnings of Christianity. With all our brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ, we
seek to follow the path of non-violence that He has taught us. Together, we
keep alive the hope that light will indeed triumph over darkness.
We love the Jewish people, their
millenia-long history and their monotheistic faith. It is they who have given
us the Bible and with it the firm conviction regarding the unique dignity of
each and every human person, created in the image of God. We totally reject
every form of anti-Semitism.
We love our Muslim brothers and sisters,
who worship the One, Almighty and Merciful God and refer regularly to Abraham,
our father in faith. Together we work to build up respectful dialogue with all
the children of Abraham.
Concretely, we give expression to our
love for the two peoples of this Land and our solidarity with the local
Churches through our social, medical, educational and charitable institutions. We
wish to constitute a bridge between the two peoples in order to promote
justice, peace and reconciliation. Constant prayer for peace and the well-being
of all occupies a central place in our religious vocation.
Due to the ancient and strong ties that
link these two peoples to the same Land, we see no other solution than sharing
and collaboration. For love of Israel and for love of Palestine, we join our
voices to those of the entire world, crying out: Stop this war! This is a cry
of the love that drives us. Violence will not halt violence. Only peace can
give security to all.
There is no peace without justice; there
is no reconciliation without mutual forgiveness. H.H. Pope John Paul II has
reminded us of that in his message for the World Peace Day, at the beginning of
this year. The terrible sufferings that have afflicted this Land and all its
inhabitants remind us of the urgency to build peace together. Relying on Scripture,
we know that the suffering of the Servant will bring healing for the whole
world (Is 53,5).
We pray that the prophecy of Isaiah will
be realized, that nations will no longer lift up the sword against each other
and that they will no longer practise the art of war. House of Jacob, come, let
us go in the light of the Lord (Is 2,5).
Respectfully,
Men and Women Religious of the Holy Land
Friday,
April 26, 2002
Vatican´s Position Vis-ŕ-vis the Holy Land
26-Apr-02
Zenit -The World Seen from Rome
Interview with Archbishop Tauran, Secretary for Relations with States
Q: A very critical point is the Holy Land. What is the Vatican's position?
Archbishop Tauran: I repeat: There are two peoples with equal rights. The Israelis with the right to security; the Palestinians, a land and state. No right should prevail over another.
It is absolutely necessary that the force of law prevail over the law of force. I repeat this with great conviction in these days, in which yet again contempt for life and armed violence are taking an entire region, perhaps beyond its borders, to the abyss.
Q: What steps should be taken to unite peace and justice again in the Holy Land?
Archbishop Tauran: Withdrawal from the Occupied Territories, respect for U.N. resolutions, the involvement of the international community, and the recognition of an international juridical statute for the holy places.
Q: The latter, a topic that is again of very great importance, following the invasion of the Basilica of the Nativity in Bethlehem by 200 Palestinians.
Archbishop Tauran: The entry of those armed men is a violation of a holy place. However, the problem will not be resolved by force.
The Vatican has proposed the establishment of an Israeli-Palestinian bilateral commission to address the question. More generally, we can see, as history teaches, that guarantees diminish when the protection of holy places is entrusted to only one national authority.
This is why we again ask that the international community be the guarantor of places loved by Jews, Muslims and Christians -- loved by faithful of the whole planet.
Q: In your address, you explained that the defense of life and the family is one of the new fields of the Vatican's international action. How can this commitment be integrated in the construction of the European Union, where there are states, like Holland, for example, which legalize practices such as euthanasia?
Archbishop Tauran: We encourage the European episcopates to know how to help peoples to become aware of the challenges, and political leaders to make the right decisions, in the perspective of a plan of society that is respectful of human dignity and freedom and of natural morality.
Bethlehem siege and humanitarian principles
Sir: Amidst the appalling human tragedy unfolding in the Middle East I wish to draw attention to the fact that over two hundred people, Christians and Moslems, are in serious danger of being allowed to starve to death in the Church of the Nativity at Bethlehem, the birthplace of Christ. Among them, we believe, are some 80 Catholic priests and nuns, as well as a large number of armed and unarmed Palestinians who burst into the church on 2nd April and claimed its sanctuary. Since that date, no food or water has been allowed into the Church. Supplies are now running dangerously low.
The government of Israel has made clear that an attack on the Church by the defense forces which surround it is not envisaged. If the present situation were allowed to continue there can only be two possible outcomes to the impasse: a negotiated settlement or the slow death by starvation of those held in the Church.
To deprive people food and water and to deny the wounded essential medical assistance is contrary to humanitarian principles enshrined in international law. I appeal to the Israeli government to allow food, water and medical supplies into the Church without delay and without prejudice to continuing efforts to resolve the standoff.
CORMAC MURPHY-O’CONNOR
Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster
London SW1
The Independent – 24th April 2002
Letter from Bethlehem
(23)
Toine van Teeffelen
April 15-22, 2002
Over three weeks
of curfew makes life somehow timeless. The muezzin and church bells are silent,
except for the ‘opening hours’ when we are allowed to leave home. My neighbour
and I grow a beard; we compete which will be the longest at the end of the
Bethlehem occupation. When summer time was introduced in the West Bank last
week, Mary and her family decided that it all does not make much of a
difference, with no work and school, and that we could as well keep the old
time. As if we wish to stay out of time. In fact, Mary and I sometimes forget
the day of the week.
While the
opening hours are the major events marking time, they are ambiguous, sometimes
dreadful, sometimes pleasant. You have to do a lot in that brief period,
including shopping (long queues especially for the valuable tomatoes, so you
have to go out immediately when the hour strikes); going to the doctor for
Tamer’s vaccination, and – the nice side - meeting visitors and family who for
the first time see Tamer and want to say mabrouk [congratulations].
Strangely enough, going out is not pleasant at all, with the unbearable stench
at the piles of garbage every street corner, the sand on the streets (which
makes you consider taking a bath afterwards), watching the lanterns and
electricity poles knocked down, and of course the tanks which shamelessly fire
in the air just for intimidation.
*
* *
On Sunday, a new
development. Mary tells me lightly: “They are going from house to house.” I
ask: “Who, the people of the food convoy or of the march?” Both a food convoy
and religious marchers attempted to enter Bethlehem that day. Mary: ‘No, the
soldiers.” A neighbour opposite calls to say that the soldiers went twice in
her house, the second time during the evening, and that her family was
requested to stay outside while the soldiers were searching. Afterwards they
left utensils to break the door of their neighbour upstairs.
Mary looks
outside and sees some twenty soldiers entering houses. Some go inside, others
guard the environment. The people peep through their windows. Jara joins window
watching and observes a soldier relieving himself near a gate that leads to our
house. “He should not do pee-pee on the ground, that is dirty.” She starts to
chant her verse: Batteech, shamaam, Sharon zaghlek fil hammaam
[watermelon, yellow melon, Sharon slips in the toilet]. She asks me to march
behind her, we are the Israeli army. She takes a plastic knife in her hand
which is the gun, and starts shouting shalom aleichem.After a while we
watch through the door window how our own house, some two hundred meters
downhill, is surrounded by soldiers. I tell Mary, who is worried. I try to calm
her. “At least we took out all the valuables.” She says, “It is not the
valuables, it is the idea.” The soldiers come and go, we cannot see whether
they enter; our door is just beyond view. Later on we hear from neighbours that
windows are broken but that they have not entered. So we have luck. The
neighbour next door did not. He is the head of a ministerial committee of the PNA for Moslem-Christian
relations. There was some intensive shooting at his house; apparently the
soldiers had forced their way. Would they think that our house is linked to the
PNA?
Jara asks
whether the soldiers shoot at birds. While playing in the garden these days she
has begun to love birds. Neighbours are calling each other, the lines are busy.
“Have they entered?” “Lissa [not yet]” One neighbour is praying
continuously. I tell Jara that she should not be afraid. “Papa is a foreigner
and they will not harm foreigners and their family.” I tell her that the
soldiers may come in but that we can bring the word out, to journalists, to
others. We can always do something, is my message to her, she does not need to
really feel vulnerable. What can you say?
Then the
soldiers come in front of the house. Jara panicks and hides under a pillow.
Mary opens the door. There are five. They want to see the men’s IDs. Mary says
that there are two men in the house: me, a Dutchman, and a baby of three weeks
old. Childishly, I take pleasure
in standing on the doorstep so as to tower over the soldiers. I show the
passport. The five men look shy. Only the commander takes a good look in the
cupboards, under the mattrasses and the beds. “You think there are people
there?” asks Mary. “We search for weapons.” First Mary wants to prevent them to
enter the baby room, but I allow the commander on condition that he remains
silent. Fortunately, he is polite.
Jara is calmer
now. After the soldiers leave, she wants to play outside. She’d better release
her tension, I decide. So we play in the garden amidst a group of soldiers who
first allow us to play but after a while send us back. We go in and after a
while out again, to play with the neighbour’s dog, also under the eyes of
soldiers who now go into a neighbouring house. I want to stay outside to let
them feel the presence of a foreigner, whatever difference that may make. At
one point the soldiers say in English “behave yourself” to the barking dog.
Indeed.
They ask if we
have the neighbour’s key. Mary knows that the neighbours are upstairs, maybe
they hide themselves. She asks the soldiers whether they want to search the
nearby house of a good friend of hers. She has the keys. I join a soldier to
point out the location but they say that they will not enter. Who knows, says
Mary. Some of the soldiers sit on the ground, bored. Mary starts an argument,
angry because our house is damaged. The soldiers: “We look for Hamas.” “Who
made Hamas?” says Mary. “Sharon is a bigger terrorist than Hamas.” A soldier:
“We gave you 96%” “We want 100%,” says Mary furiously. “What about Arafat’s
corruption?” “That’s our problem. Why are you breaking the glass of our home?”
The commander first denies that anything is broken, then admits with a shrug of
the shoulders. On Mary’s question what he thinks about Jenin, he doesn’t
answer. “He couldn’t say anything.” My own conversing with the soldiers is not
argumentative, but I refuse to greet or say niceties when they start praising
Jara’s looks.
Jara tells the
neighbour’s son about what happened: “Papa opened the cupboards, they looked,
and Khalas [that was it].” The neighbour is worried since the soldiers
took their IDs and Latin American passports. More phone calls. Somebody in the
neighbourhood tells that the soldiers took away his binoculars. A friend of
Mary calls to say that she is worried that they will take away her son.
Meanwhile, a few houses further down, the soldiers appropriate the house of an
absent lawyer for sleeping and eating purposes, and whatever else they do.
*
* *
Next day, we
visit our house during opening hours. The locker and door are badly damaged, we
see traces of soldier’s boots on it. We can’t enter through the main door. They
had apparently tried to enter with some primitive equipment. Through an opening
in one window a curtain was pulled so that it came down. Several window glasses
are broken. We manage to enter through a side door, take out the broken glass and
put some covers in the openings. Then we enter our neighbour’s, Emile
Jarjoueh’s house, which is in a complete mess: broken computers, printers,
files on the ground, a large photo of Arafat which is of course shot into
pieces, even an image of the Last Supper is destroyed with zeal. Outside two
cars are shot through. We take pictures. I understand it was the same group who
had entered the house where we stay. Mary and I discuss how soldiers who look
polite can so unleash themselves when foreigners do not watch. A double face.
The Real Aim
Uri Avnery
27.4.02
The real aim of
“Operation Defensive Shield” was not to “destroy the infrastructure of terrorism”.
This was merely a
good slogan for uniting the people of Israel, who are angry and afraid after
the suicide bombings. It is also a good political device, allowing Sharon to
ride on the bandwagon of President Busch’s “war against international
terrorism”. Under the umbrella of “destroying the infrastructure of terrorism”
one can do practically anything.
If Sharon had really
intended to “destroy the infrastructure of terrorism”, he would have acted very
differently. He would have given the Palestinian masses hope of achieving their
national freedom in the near future. He would have fortified the position of
Yasser Arafat, the only effective partner for peace. He would have strengthened
the Palestinian security forces and radically improved economic conditions in
the Palestinian territories.
But destroying the
infrastructure of terrorism is not Ariel Sharon’s aim. His program is far more
radical: to break the backbone of the Palestinian people, crush their
governmental institutions, turn the people into human wreckage that can be
dealt with as he wishes. This may
entail shutting them up in several enclaves or even driving them out of the
country altogether.
As Sharon sees it,
this would be finishing off the job started in 1948: to establish the real
Israel, from the Mediterranean to the Jordan river; a state inhabited solely by
Jews. It was no accident that he openly supported Slobodan Milosevic, the
inventor of “ethnic cleansing”.
When I wrote
this a year ago, it sounded like malicious slander. Sharon was still pictured
as a man determined to fight terrorism, not as a person using the fight against
terrorism as a means to achieve quite different aims.
No more.
Four days ago I was
in Ramallah. I sneaked into the town (Israelis are forbidden by the military
commander from entering the Palestinian territories) in order to see it for
myself. I visited the Palestinian ministries. A shocking sight, indeed.
Take, for example,
the Palestinian Ministry of Education. It is housed in an imposing building,
probably going back to British times, a mixture of neo-Classic European and
oriental styles. In front of it there was a rose garden – “was”, because a tank
has crisscrossed it, for no apparent reason, leaving only one purple rosebush
in all its glory. Just so. To teach them a lesson.
On the upper floor,
where the archives and computers were housed, the destruction was total. The
computers were taken apart and thrown on the floor, the safe blown open, the
papers strewn around, the drawers empty, the telephones crushed . Some of it
was just plain vandalism. The money in the safe was stolen, the furniture
upturned, the papers dispersed. But when one looked closer, the real aim of the
operation became clear. All the hard disks were taken from the computers, all
the important files taken away. Only empty shells remained. All the important
contents of the ministry were taken: the lists of pupils, examination results,
lists of teachers, the whole logistics of the Palestinian school system.
The Ministry if
Health suffered the same fate. The hard disks that contained all the
information, state of diseases, medical tests, lists of doctors and nurses, the
logistics of the hospitals had been taken.
Even the people most
critical of the Palestinian Authority admitted that these two ministries –
Education and Health – had been functioning well. They have been utterly
destroyed.
This happened to
virtually all the Palestinian government offices. Gone is the information
pertaining to land registration and housing, taxes and government expenditure,
car tests and drivers’ licenses, everything necessary for administrating a
modern society.
The lists of
terrorists were not hidden in the land registration books, the inventory of
bombs was not tucked away among the list of kindergarten teachers. The real aim
is obvious: to destroy not only the Palestinian Authority, but Palestinian society
itself: to push it back with one stroke from the stage of a modern
state-in-the-making to the primitive society of Turkish times.
This is true for the
civil society, and even more so for the security system. The headquarters of
the security services were destroyed, files burned, computers crushed, the
information concerning armed underground organizations and all other details
pertaining to the war against terrorism were obliterated. There is no better
evidence of the aims of this operation: not war on terrorism, but destruction
of organized Palestinian society.
By the way, on that
day I passed, with a group of Israeli peace activists, through the center of
Ramallah – from the mass-grave in the hospital parking lot to the besieged
headquarters of Yasser Arafat. We carried Hebrew posters and encountered much
sympathy and not a single sign of hostility. Even at this time, the
Palestinians know the difference between the Israeli peace camp and those who
responsible for this brutal attack. Here, perhaps, lies the only glimmer of
hope.
Occupation in
process
written by: Ghassan Andoni
Yesterday the
Israeli occupation authorities “the newly revived civil administration”
announced its intention to expropriate 50 Dunams of Land owned by people from
Beit Sahour. The expropriation order was issued yesterday. The army arrived in
Beit Sahour, entered the mosque during the Friday prayer and through copies of
the expropriation order on the floor and left. The order offers landowners a
period of 48 hours to protest against the expropriation order.
While the reason
of expropriation was defined as “for military purposes” the area subject to
expropriation is adjacent to the under construction, but not yet inhabited, Har
Homa settlement. The apparent purpose of this new expropriation is to expand the
settlement and proceed with the plans to cage the Palestinians of Bethlehem
area.
Occupation is
not only a direct assault against individuals but rather a continued acts of
hostility aimed at destroying a full nation. Exploiting its resources, imposing
long term inhuman conditions, destroying any hope for community development,
and expropriating its future hopes and dreams.
Such acts
reveals beyond any doubts the systematic character of the occupation oppressive
plans. Nothing can be more legitimate than working to end this evil occupation.
===================================================
The Palestinian Centre for Rapprochement between People
Beit Sahour – Palestine www.rapprochement.org
Payer for Peace
Oh God, grant
peace to Your Holy Land and to the whole world! Root it deeply in the hearts of
all humanity. For Your divine peace is the peace the world cannot give. Your
peace sets free all those caught in the nets of physical and psychological
violence, whether perpetrator or victim.
We
feel powerless as we witness the many forms of violence and injustice in war in
politics in society and even in individual lives.
Oh
God, fill those in authority with your Spirit of Love and Justice. Help us
also, to contribute to the establishment of your Kingdom of Peace by
acknowledging and living according to Your Divine Law, given to us for the
peace and well-being of all humanity and the whole of Your creation.
For that we
pray, oh God of love and faithfulness.
We praise You
and thank You forever and ever. Amen.
|
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Thank you for your understanding & with best wishes from
Jerusalem Fr. Raed Abusahlia |