Marlin & Sally in Jerusalem

Collective Punishment

In the 3rd grade class of my growing up days, the teacher had a standard policy of collective punishment.  If one child acted up in class, then the whole class would be punished.  "Okay, Marlin Vis, now you've done it.  The whole class will stay in for recess."

Hamas, or whomever is responsible for the action that has led to the deaths of two Israeli soldiers, one Jewish settler, two Palestinian militants, and the capture of Corporal Gilad Shalit, is stupid.  I'm sorry to say it, but to do this while you are in the middle of ground breaking negotiations that could open up a real opportunity for peace is an act of immeasurable stupidity.  Either that, or such is the action of those who do not want peace, which makes what they have done something far worse than merely stupid.

But Israel's response is mean.  Israel is punishing the whole people of Gaza, and the West Bank too, for what was done by a few.  Israel is being mean.  I'm sorry to say it, but it is absolutely the truth, Israel is being just plain mean.  Destroying the only power plant in all of Gaza is an act of utter meanness.  Either that, or such is the action of those who want innocent people to suffer, and that makes what they are doing worst than merely mean.

Hamas' action is stupid.  Israel's response is mean.  And the International community's silence is cowardly, and therefore contributes to the chaos in Gaza and the West Bank.

Where is the outrage at Israel's systematic destruction of the infrastructure of Gaza?  Why has not one country of note challenged a strategy that intentionally brings suffering to one and a half million people because of what was done by a handful of extremists with questionable motives.

I'm tired of mincing words and being subtle, and yes, all those other entries have been my best shot at subtly.  No subtly today.  Today I speak as plainly as I know how.

What is happening in Gaza is wrong.  It is immoral.  It is sin.  The goal is to get Gilad Shalit released, and to spare innocent Gazan people from further suffering.  What is happening right now will not accomplish either of those.

 

If you agree ,then hit this site and do something about it.

Shrugs All Around

(Today's photo is not connected to the time and place of today's blog story.  The picture was taken back in February by photographer Mark Nelsen and is used with his permission.  The story is from yesterday, Wednesday, June 28.)

A couple of hundred soldiers are milling around in front of the Western Wall.  They are all young, dressed in olive green, and carrying automatic rifles.  They stand in clusters of four or five – buddies.  Your first reaction is one of envy.  You envy the camaraderie, the sense of purpose, and the power evident in the soldier’s swagger.  They have the numbers.  They have the guns.  They have the power.  And they know they have all these tangibles, as well as the intangibles of national pride and prejudice, Palestinian humiliation and subjugation, and international envy and ambivalence.

On my second try, I find a group who will talk with me.  The first group feigns a lack of knowledge of English.  I know they are lying about not speaking English and I do not let that go.  But I do not dwell on it either.  I move on.

“You speak English?”

“A little.” It’s the modest response you always get from Israeli or Palestinian.  The truth is they speak English very well, a thousand times better than I speak Arabic or Hebrew.

“Did you get your comrade back?”

Shrugs all around.

“Corporal Gilad Shalit, did you get him back yet?

They look at each other and then one of them responds for all of them, “Not yet, but we will.  We will get him back.”

“I hope they give him back to you.  That would be the best.”

Shrugs all around.

“Wouldn’t it?”  My eyes move from one pair to the next, until I find a set that is looking back.   He has dark eyes, and a five-o-o’clock shadow.  He reaches and places his left hand on my right shoulder.

“Don’t worry,” he says,  “tonight we will begin to make them pay.”

“Pay?”

“Yes.”

“And people will die.”

Shrugs all around.

“Right?” I persist.  “Israeli soldiers will die too, right?”

He removes his hand from my shoulder and replies, “We are willing to die if that is what it takes.”

I am both moved and saddened by his response.  He means it of course.  He is a soldier. “I don’t want you to die,” I say.  “And I don’t want you to kill either.  I want the dying and the killing to stop.  Don’t you?”

Shrugs all around.

Who Holds the Keys?

It’s hard to see the Palestinian point of view, but I think we have a moral obligation to try.  So, please, let’s try.

Israel has over 8,000 Palestinians held in one prison or another.  (Since February 2005, Israel has refused to freely release statistics on the exact number of Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.  If you want that information, it will cost you, and it will take time. As of January 2006 the exact number was 8,238, with 4,019 being held without trial.) In January 2006, 228 youth and children were among those being held in Israeli prisons, 39 under the age of 16.  (The last few months there has been a sharp increase in the number of youth and children arrested and jailed, so we know the number is close to, or over, 300.)  85+ of these youth and children have yet to be tried. I personally know of two 15-year-olds from Aroub refugee camp that have been in prison for 4 months now, without trial, for the crime of throwing stones at Israeli tanks.  100 women, many with small children and babies, are included among the 8,000. On the one hand, 100 women with their children is not a lot.  On the other hand, none of these is your daughter, mother or wife.

Many Palestinians – not all, not most, but many – support holding Cpl Gilad Shalit for the release of Palestinian women, youth and children.  Maybe we can at least try to understand why they feel that way.  We don't have to agree, but we should at least try to understand.  That's what I try to do here -- understand?

There is another point of view among Palestinians, and this point of view is shared by most, if not all.   Most Palestinians believe that he/she is, in some way or another, a prisoner, and furthermore, no Palestinian knows who holds the keys for release.  Most Palestinians feel helpless, because they cannot control those who continually pull the strings to prolong their captivity.  I believe that most Palestinians are morally responsible people and as morally responsible people most Palestinians want Cpl Gilad Shalit released, just as they want the release of the nameless, faceless women and children held in Israeli prisons, just as they want to be freed themselves.

The question is: Who holds the keys?

The ARTS

(I apologize for the "red eye" in the first photo.  I tried to get that out, but couldn't.  Please overlook it -- no pun intended.)

I’ve always liked Civic Theatre.  Therefore, I like the Palestinian Civic Theatre located in East Jerusalem.  It’s made up of a bunch of good folks who care about youth and who believe that the Arts is a way to change culture for the better.  There is a sense of urgency connected to the productions at the Palestinian Theatre. The folks who support this place have an advantage over civic theatre in other places, I think.  They know that their culture has to evolve into something more, something more civil, I guess they would say.  What I want to stress is that the difference between them and us in the West, for example, is that they KNOW they have to change.  They KNOW that if the people that make up Palestinian society do not start to get it, then pretty soon there will be nothing to get.  The extreme fringe of Palestinian Society is slowly swallowing up the whole and these folks are frightened by it.  (By the way, the same thing is happening in Israeli society, and maybe in America as well.)  I admire the folks who work in the arts here.  They are trying, and they are working under the worst possible conditions.  But they are trying.

Sunday night’s production was a dance show.  There was a lot of energy in the room.  The young people were having great fun.  These youth and children had practiced and practiced to do this well.  They had made their way through checkpoints and curfews to rehearse.  And they were good, some of them very good.  And they never stopped smiling.  Their smiles were not the stage smiles taught and practiced, but the smiles of joy and release.  They were doing something positive and they were doing it well.  They were dancing, expressing themselves to an adoring audience.  Yes, it was amateurish, but it was beautiful too.

The story line concerned the clash within culture that is happening in Palestinian Society.  This clash was illustrated through using the tension that exists between emerging modern, interpretive dance, and the old tribal dance handed down from generation to generation.  (Sound familiar?)  At the end of the production, a young woman walked slowly on stage and delivered the pivotal lines in the evening.  She spoke the heart of her dancing friends.  As interpreted to me, this is what she said: “Teach your children the Arts, and let them follow their hearts.” She stood there for a moment or two, the important pause for effect.  Then the entire cast joined her on stage and stood with her, modern dancers in tights and leotards intermingled with those in the traditional garb.  They stood holding hands and looking out on the audience.  I found it quite moving.  The silence in the room told me that the audience did as well.

“Teach your children the Arts, and let them follow their hearts.”  Pretty good, huh?

And by the way, I don’t think the art of war is one of the Arts that will change Palestinian, Israeli, Western or any society for the better.  But, of course, I could be wrong.

Theatre

Went to the theatre last night, Palestinian Theatre located a 10-minute walk from our apartment.

A three or four-year-old little girl sat in the aisle one step down but right next to me, on my left.  She kept turning to look up into my face.  I don’t know what to call that look for sure.  I’ve seen it a hundred times in the face of my own granddaughter.  What to name it?  I don’t know, but the vulnerability, non-judgment, and openness in the face of the children, the littlest among us, hold out a glimmer of hope for a better day.

“Who are you?  What are you doing here?  Are you Jewish?  Are you safe?” No, she doesn’t ask me those questions, at least not with tongue and mouth, but the look wants to know.  The big dark eyes, the slightly furrowed brow, the pursed little mouth, these want an answer.  “Who are you?”  Many Palestinian children think that anyone who is not like them is then Jewish.  That’s why so many children say “Shalom” to me as I walk in the streets.  I used to think they were taunting me, but it turns out they were just being friendly to someone they thought was Jewish.  Funny how we tend to jump to the negative conclusions, isn’t it?  How did that happen?   

I reached out and gently scratched the top of her pigtailed head – four pigtails to be exact, two up high and two down lower.  I scratched her head, and like any little girl, she leaned right into it.  Ah, the power of touch! Her mother turns to look.  I raise my eyebrows slightly to ask if it’s okay.  She nods and smiles.  I am grateful.

As the house lights dim, I lean back to enjoy the show.  The story line, I am told, revolves around the theme of culture clash.  The music begins, and an energetic group of dancers bursts onto the stage.  The little girl, sitting on the aisle one step down but right next to me, on my left, pushes herself up one step to sit beside me.  At this movement, her mother turns again to look.  She looks at her daughter, then up at me.  She cocks her head slightly, to the left I think, and raises her eyebrows to ask me if it’s okay.  The little girl has her elbows resting on her knees with chin settled into her hands.  She is busy watching the dancers.  My eyes tear and the mother sees them as they do.  Now she furrows her brow to ask if I’m okay.

“I have a granddaughter in the States,” I whisper.

“You miss her,” she states.

“Yes,” I say.

“She’s a good little girl,” she says, nodding toward her daughter.

“I can see that,” I respond.

“Okay?” she says, nodding toward her daughter.

“Okay.”

Today Gaza is bracing for a retaliatory response from Israeli for the deaths of two Israeli soldiers killed early Sunday morning by Palestinian military.  Children are going to die this week, just as children died yesterday morning in that firefight.  One 19-year-old child is being held captive by his enemies.  The older I get the more I become aware that in war, it is children who kill, and it is children who die, and God help us all as we stand by and let it go on and on and on.  To most of us those who die this week will be nameless, faceless statistics.  Not to me.

And no, it’s not okay.

And yes, it could be stopped.  If enough mothers and grandfathers said, "This is not okay."  Then it would stop.   

The Problem is so BIG

On the left you'll note one article for your reading. Each week I'll just add one with hopes that you'll be able to take time to read that one. This one is very important.

(The photo on the bottom of the page is from the Tomb of Mary located at the bottom of the Mount of Olives.  That explains Mary front and center in the picture.  It is, however, the Pentecost theme that draws me to it.)

“The problem is so big, isn’t it?”

That was her statement in question form, this good woman from the United Kingdom.  She is 74-years-old and she lives in the tough town of Hebron.  Her dwelling is literally and figuratively located directly between the warring Jewish settlers and the primarily Muslim Palestinians.  I’ve been on the roof of her home and standing there you stand in a kind of no-man’s zone that is like a triangle if you can imagine it, and I know you can’t entirely, but try.  The Israeli military is on one side, the Jewish settlers on another, and the Muslims of Hebron sit below at the base of the triangle.  This old woman, who can lick her weight in twenty-or-thirty-or-forty-something couch potatoes, willingly, or should I say, willfully, lives in the middle of a war zone.

“The problem is so big, isn’t it?”

We all nod of course, nothing to say really, just nod and let your mind go on check for a minute or two.

We are a group of about 9 or 10 Internationals sitting together in the living room of a Quaker couple's apartment of the top of the Mount of Olives.  Odd ducks, Quakers, almost warlike in their pursuit of justice and peace.  They scare me a little because they have a take-no-prisoners attitude toward folks who are into oppression and peace-breaking.  As a whole, my experience with Quakers is that they are not particularly good with words, and consider mincing them a complete waste of time.  You have something to say, say it.  You don’t like what you just heard, challenge it.  Nothing meek or mild about these Quakers, or their cousins, the Mennonites.  I hearken back to the days of slavery in the United States, not that long ago really, and I remember that it was the fierce and willful Quakers and Mennonites who ran the underground railroad, and who time and time again stood up to those armed and dangerous men who hunted runaways for a living.

“The problem is so big, isn’t it?”

The evening ends on that note.  We sit in silence for a minute or two, then slowly begin to move to our feet and toward the door.  We say our thank yous and good-byes, and walk into the warm Jerusalem night.  Each of us head for our homes, scattered throughout the city and into places with names I can’t remember yet.

The next morning, the sun comes up, and we rise to greet another day.  Nobody calls his/her travel agent to book a flight back home.  We go back to tackling the BIG problem as if our puny efforts against the “principalities and powers” really make a difference.

“The problem is so big, isn’t it?”

Just nod your head in agreement.  Go ahead, it will make you feel better.  Nod your head, and then sit there in front of your computer for a minute or two.  The mind can’t compute the magnitude of the matter, can it?  Your brain just goes on tilt, right?  It’s okay, don’t worry about the BIG problem.  Instead, do something to help. "What, Marlin, what?"  I don’t know, but thank God, I'm not God and I'm not you either so it's not my job to know what you can or cannot do.  God knows what you can do and if you have ears to hear and eyes to see then God will let you hear and let you see what you can do to help.  Then do it!  That little “it” that you can do, do that!  Do it!

The problem is BIG, but together, we are not as small as we think we are.

Let's Pray

“Every time I feel the Spirit moving in my heart, I will pray” (Negro-Spiritual).

Let’s pray:

“Lord God of the Universe, Maker of all, we bless and thank you for the gift of this day, and we stand in awe at your gracious invitation to join you in the work of salvation.  We accept, and now humbly ask that you give us eyes to see you at work in the world so that we might join you as your grateful servants.

“We pray for those who have no place to lay their head, no peace, no justice, no hope.

“We pray for those who are hungry, who have no bread, no meat to put meat on their bones, no peace, no justice, no hope.

“We pray for those who are thirsty, who have no water to drink, no water in which to wash their babies or themselves, no water to grow their own food, no peace, no justice, no hope.

“We pray for those who are naked, who have no coat to keep out the chill, no blanket to cover their children at night, no shoes, no peace, no justice, no hope.

"We pray for those who are in prison, who have no advocate to fight for them, no media voice to tell their side of the story, no peace, no justice, no hope.

“We pray for those who have eyes to see, eyes to hear, and hearts to care about the homeless, the hungry, the thirsty, the naked, and those in prison, but who are overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of the misery.

“We ask for a place for the displaced, bread and meat for the hungry, water and milk for the thirsty, coats and blankets for the naked, visitors and voice for the prisoner, visions and dreams for those who see, hear and care.  We ask for peace, justice and hope.

“Gracious God, we come to you because we do not know where else to go.  You have the words of truth, the tools for peace, the passion for justice and the power for hope.

“Hear our prayer, for we pray in the name of Jesus, and by the power of the Holy Spirit.

AMEN.

“Surely his salvation is at hand for those who fear him, that his glory may dwell in our land.  Steadfast love and faithfulness will meet; righteousness and peace will kiss each other.  Faithfulness will spring up from the ground, and righteousness will look down from the sky. The LORD will give what is good, and our land will yield its increase. Righteousness will go before him, and will make a path for his steps” (Psalm 85:9-13).

The "Eyes" Have It

(I let you find her.)

It’s the eyes that draw you to her.

This week is World Refugee Week.  Yesterday, June 20, was World Refugee Day.

I spent the day with refugees, Palestinian refugees, all of whom have known nothing except displacement and occupation.  Many Palestinian refugees speak of their anger and bitterness.  Others speak of feeling hopeless and helpless.  Out of deep hurt, they speak of being forgotten, discarded, like rubbish.  Most of them agree that it is the lack of control that affects them the most.  They cannot go where they want to go.  They cannot live where they want to live.  They are under occupation, and therefore they are under somebody’s thumb.  The fact that the thumb they are under is on the hand of a people who themselves have drunk from the cup of oppression ought not be lost on any of us, especially not on this day.  “You shall not deprive a resident alien or an orphan of justice; you shall not take a widow’s garment in pledge. Remember that you were a slave in Egypt and the LORD your God redeemed you from there; therefore I command you to do this" (Deut. 24:17-18)

The ones that I am drawn too are those who do not speak with their mouths and tongues, but with their eyes.  If it is true that the eyes are the windows to the soul then that which dwells in the bowels of many refugees is frighteningly beyond comprehension to anyone who hasn’t been there, and maybe even to most who have.

Of the little Palestinian girl in Al-Aroub refugee camp, the one on the merry-go-around with her little sister, I want to ask, “What’s in there, down there, buried inside you?  What are you thinking as you look at me, as you never take your eyes off me?  Why don’t your eyes blink?  Why doesn’t your tongue speak?  In losing you, what have we lost?”

Ben Gurion, Israel’s first Prime Minister, said the “old will die and the young will forget.”

I’m sorry Mr. Prime Minister, but I don’t think this little girl is going to forget.  I don't think the little girls carrying the big guns and guarding the camps are going to forget what they've seen either.  And furthermore, sir, I think your people ought to begin remembering who they are and what they are called to be and do.

And the rest of us ought to be reminded that but for the grace of God, we are that little girl.  And furthermore, friends, we are among those who enable Israel to collectively remember only what was done to them while ignoring what they are doing to little girls like the one in Al-Aroub refugee camp.

Jamileh

(The first photo is self-explanatory.  The second is of a shopkeeper opening up his shop in what was once the bustling Old City of Hebron.  The last photo is of a young boy getting his hair cut in the Aroub Child Center.  The beautician was trained in the Center and now makes extra money for her family by working there.  Trust me, the cost of a hair cut is more than reasonable.)

Her name means “beautiful” in Arabic and she is that both inside and out.  She is the director of Aroub Child Center which operates in Al-Aroub refugee camp.  The land around Al-Aroub is lush and green, the hills and valleys are covered with the famous grape trees of Hebron.  Hebron is famous for her grapes and Al-Aroub is located just outside of Hebron.

Jamileh was born in Al-Aroub refugee camp.  Just take a minute and let that sink in, okay?  She was born and raised with no citizenship, no country to claim her, no deed to the house, no family farm upon which to raise grapes and figs and olives.  She has papers that declare that she is a refugee.  These papers prevent her from leaving the camp except to go to school or to work if you are one of the few who has a job out side of camp.  Jamileh is a refugee and has been all her life.  I’d tell you to imagine that, but you can’t, so I won’t.

Jamileh is good at her job, very, very good.  She takes her work very seriously, because the work she and her team do is serious work.  Holding together the fragile psyches of third generation refugee children is not a task for someone who simply works for the weekend.  The Center offers a long list of activities and programs that I’m not going to list, simply because the Center’s value is not primary in what it does.  The Center’s worth comes out of the very fact of its existence.  The Center epitomizes what I see so vividly within the Palestinian people.  They persevere.  They do not quit.  They do not fit the stereotype that many have of Palestinian men and women.

Palestinian mommies and daddies send their children to school even when it is difficult and sometimes dangerous for them to get there.  They encourage their youth to go to college, or get vocational training, even though there are no jobs at the end of the road.  The shopkeepers open their shops everyday, except Fridays for the Muslims and Sundays for the Christians.  They dust off their wares and put them out on the street even though there is no money in the hands of their shoppers, even though Israeli tour guides tell their groups not to buy from Palestinian shops in the Old City.  Still Palestinian businessmen do what there fathers and grandfathers did before them; they open for business.

I see how patient the Palestinian people are with the occupation and I admire them for it.  You see and hear on your television set a group of angry men marching in the streets, waving guns and shouting slogans.  I see Jamileh and the majority of Palestinians, who, like her, get up every day and go out to make a living or a difference or a statement, or simply to make do with what they have been given.

Palestinian people, just like any other, have their warts, but, like Jamileh, I can see that they are “beautiful,” both inside and out.

Day Dreamin'

(No, the first picture is not of my grandson.  Sorry to confuse you.  But read on and you'll see Brayden and you'll get to know more about this first child, who is somebody's grandchild.  Maybe even, everybody's grandchild.)

I can’t get him out of my head.

He’s my grandson, and I can’t stop thinking about him.  He’s beautiful I think.  His mommy, daddy and big sister live in Zeeland, MI, USA.  Nice little town, Zeeland. Like most American towns Zeeland is a little unaware of the big, good world around them, and a lot self-absorbed with making good and looking good, but nice people, Zeeland people, and nice town, Zeeland, MI, USA.  I’m glad my grandson and granddaughter live in Zeeland.  They’ll be safe there, protected, and a bright future stretches out before them.  Brayden and Emma will go to college and probably even graduate school.  Maybe one of them will carry on the family torch of full-time, professional ministry.  Maybe Emma will be the first female president of the United States.  Or maybe even better, she’ll be a determined and dedicated school social worker like her mother, or a pre-school teacher like her Aunt Kim.  Perhaps, like her nana, she’ll grow up to be fierce and tender, possessed by the Spirit, and therefore equipped to transcend education or position to reach the height of power that makes her able to make more of those around her than of herself.

Enough about Emma, it’s Brayden who is on my mind today.  I have yet to meet him, or him me, but I have dreams to dream of him, and dream of him I do. It’s a grandfather’s job to dream dreams of his grandchildren, and to whisper those grand, sweet dreams into their growing minds and hearts. Who is he, this tiny, God-knitted child?  What will he be like?  What is the small, almost indistinct nuance of distinction that God stitched to Brayden’s spirited DNA?  Who among us will be alert enough to see it, name it, protect it, water and feed it, and celebrate it as it blossoms and blooms?

What I want for other children, is only the same that I want for my own children and grandchildren.  I want them to have a chance to become who God made them to be when God made them in their mothers’ wombs.  I want to give Palestinian fathers and papas a little hope so that they will begin to dream again of their grandchildren, and will begin again to whisper those grand, sweet dreams into their growing minds and hearts.  God knows there are enough other soft voices whispering in their ears, and what these voices whisper will only produce living nightmares for the children of Palestine as well as the world into which they live and move.

Aroub Child Center, almost buried in the lost and mostly forgotten refugee camp of Al-Aroub, is a living place that lives for the single purpose of giving a child a chance to squeeze a dream into the nightmare that is his/her everyday life.  I’ve been to Al-Aroub now, so now Al-Aroub will always be with me no matter where I go.

I’ll never get them out of my head.