I have since my arrival here to East Jerusalem, Palestine, received countless emails which offer “Be careful!” “Keep your head down!” “Watch out!” “Hope you are safe” and “We are praying for you” —long before the rocket volley in Gaza began. These statements were two months ago inappropriate and even now unnecessary for they are based on the beliefs we as Americans have about the Arab world, not the reality.

I beg you, please, if you believe prayer has any means of affecting change, do not pray for me, do not waste even a moment with concern for my safety. I live in a compound on Mount of Olives with aid workers from around the world. I work in the Old City with Palestinians whom I have come to know and care for.

Pray for the Palestinians, for the family and friends of the 105 dead and more than 800 wounded, and for the families of the three Israeli’s who have needlessly perished in this useless conflict.

There is no sense of danger here in Jerusalem, nor even if the rockets come closer will I worry, for I carry a passport which grants me an easy out, at any time of night or day. Rather, I am concerned for my Palestinian friends for they cannot drive to Jordan or catch the next plane north to Barcelona. Those who live in Gaza have no means of escape, even as the rockets come down. Most are trapped under Israeli law; some disallowed from ever leaving their home town for the remainder of their lives.

I ask this of you instead—educate yourself beyond what you hear on the televised news or read in the headlines of your local paper. While these may not be overtly false, they certainly are not the full story. Let go of what you think you know about people from this part of the world and open yourself to the potential that they are a lot like you. Warm. Hospitable. Finding joy even in times of such chaos and pain.

Pray for this to end. Work to make this end. Learn what you can and ask others to do the same.

Aljazeera (Gaza news feed)
Peace Not Walls (of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America)
Ecumenical Accompaniment Programme in Palestine and Israel (EAPPI)
The Carter Center

Shame, guilt, and fear are remnants of atrocities more difficult to shake than the loss of someone we hold near, for we justify our actions in our personal psyche, and over time in our shared mythology. War criminals become heroes as time gives way to a rewritten history, in oral tradition, book, and song, but we carry the burden just the same. Generations to come confront what has been done. How many churches, how many government bodies have in the past two decades apologized for the actions of their forebearers, decades, even centuries ago?

I feel sorrow for those who bury their dead. But I feel pain for those who point and fire a weapon not in self-defense, but in an act of fear, for they live on with the burden of what they have done.

It has been a confusing time for me, here in Jerusalem. There is a sense of helplessness among those I live and work with, knowing there is nothing we can do. Hamas and Israel will do battle to the detriment of the Palestinian people. There is no intervention (that I know of) that will bring this to a rapid end.

And yet, in the Old City (where I walked to and from late this afternoon), life goes on much as usual. The Palestinian Christians or Muslims who do not observe the Islamic day of rest continue to promote their services and wares, kids run along side cars hoping to sell silver Mylar balloons with bright pink letters, “I

In the fall of 2011 while I criss-crossed the United States in my Subaru, I listened to 36 hours of the MIT 900 Cognitive Psychology lectures. While a number of facts and figures astounded me, what captured my attention most was the repeating pattern of the innate human desire to be defined by shared beliefs, practices, and aspirations.

The lectures covered the standard, historic review of psychology breakthroughs, from behaviourist B.F. Skinner’s Operant Conditioning Chamber (the “Skinner Box”) to the startling conclusions of volunteer invoked shock therapy under the subtle suggestion by an authority.

In a controlled study people were randomly divided into two groups, the red and the blue. They were told the colour to which they were assigned was their group identity. A small reward system of nominal monetary value (if I recall correctly) was applied, to instill real-world value. Then they were moved to debate, to defend their colour identity.

In very little time at all, two newly formed groups went from relatively light, playful interaction to a very real, intense exchange which resulted in group pride and subsequent defence, raised voices, and aggression. Humanity found its way to the surface and defended something as basic as a colour which would have otherwise invoked no more than a response to aesthetics.

It takes only a small cognitive leap to ask the bigger questions. When families are forced from their homes, uprooted for generations as they move across the land (I speak of any people who have been forced from their homes, Ancient Hebrews, Palestinians, Christians, Muslims, and Jews) in search of safety, what happens to their sense of identity and associated defence? Does it not speak volumes to see it as completely human for those oppressed to defend themselves with their lives, for the oppressed to become the oppressor, and for any number of incredibly challenging interactions to ripple for decades, even generations after the initial tragedy unfolds?

What’s more, How do we hold ourselves together when our identity is challenged for generations?

Finding Comfort in the Familiar
When hiking with Daniel and Haim, we discussed the laws and rituals by which one’s religion asks us to live—from clothing to food preparation to prayer. As I had come to understand, some of the Biblical rules were applied as a means by which the ancients could be encouraged to maintain healthy habits, from food preparation to social norms.

Haim jumped in quickly to state it was much more than this. Ritual, he suggested, is a means of creating comfort, of embodying same-ness. In following the traditions of clothing, food preparation, and prayer, ritual gives us comfort in knowing we belong to others like us. “If you want to know your daughter will marry into a family, a home and traditions familiar to you, those rituals say to both families, ‘This is safe. We are like you.‘”

But something happens along the way, as pride in red becomes defence against blue. Those definitions of sameness become a barrier to ethnicity, beliefs, and social norms which cause us to not feel welcomed by them. Xenophobia is again portrayed as fundamental to humanity and we are confronted with fear expressed as anger between the Jews, Christians, and Muslims, the Democrats and the Republicans, the East and the West, the Developed and Developing, the Crypts and the Bloods—the red and the blue.

While this is a deliberate understatement of the complexity of the human experience, to understand some basic concepts, how our behaviour is rooted (and how easily it is invoked) helps me to recognize my own behaviour as I move through the world and to have greater tolerance for others. I am trying to take into account the historical context of where I now live, and how both “sides” of a conflict are at some, basic level defending red in fear of blue.

Set apart
The Haredim in Israel
Dec 13, 2010 by Mordechai Beck in The Christian Century

No week passes in Israel without an article being published—usually negative in tone—about the Haredi community. According to the Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics, the Haredim, or ultra-Orthodox Jews, constitute about 8 percent of Israel’s population, or some 600,000 to 700,000 people. It is the fastest-growing segment in Israel.

What worries many Israelis, religious as well as secular, about 
the growth of the Haredim is that they reject political Zionism, the enterprise that established the state of Israel in 1948. Their first loyalty is to their spiritual leaders, not the state.

Read the rest of this informative article …

I spent yesterday and today with my assistant Farid Karreh, film student and nephew of Bishop Younan, with the Director Prof. Dr. Dieter Vieweger, Archaeologist Katja Soennecken and Museum Curator Dominic Pruessner of the German Protestant Institute of Archaeology in the Holy Land, the Research Unit of the renowned German Archaeological Institute (DEI) with a long history of work in the Middle East.

I am producing a short, educational film for the Institute, working to capture some of the knowledge and passion of those who have worked at this site, beneath the Church of the Redeemer in the Old City Jerusalem for more than three years.

The first excavation was conducted in 1893 in conjunction with the construction of this church, and again between 1970 and 1974, during the renovation of the church foundation and floor in order to improve its odds at surviving an earthquake. At this time a seven meter “deep sounding” (cut) was taken to the level of a Roman quarry, dating from 100 B.C. In the past three years, Dieter and his team cleaned this lower level and made significant, unexpected discoveries through the rest of the site, removing more than a meter of soil and rubble to expose a market street, cistern and drain, guard house, mosaic, and retaining wall originally constructed in the 4th century A.D. to hold back an elevated terrace.

Built between 1893 and 1898, the modern Church included a “time capsule” installed in the cornerstone. This was located and reopened, revealing several items which will eventually be replaced, along with some references to our modern day.

By the time of Jesus birth, the quarry on which I stand in these photos was already beneath 2-3 meters sediment. Today, Muristan Street (just outside the front door of the Church) is 14 meters above the Roman quarry, the layers comprised of both natural and human maneuvered sediment, rubble, and infill. It is often difficult to think in geologic terms, to consider the movement of this much earth in such a short period of time, let alone to consider that every block of limestone used to construct nearly every building in Israel and Palestine came from the deposition of once living plant and animal material and chemical precipitation, pressed down, heated, transformed, and lifted up again as stone.

Standing in that cut made it more tangible for me, not unlike walking down into the Grand Canyon, taking in the visible layers of sandstone, limestone, schist, shale, various igneous flows, granite, and eventually bedrock. I regained a strong sense of how quickly the earth does shift, move, and churn. In just one century the precise work of laborers was completely buried. Two millennia and one requires a concerted effort to locate the quarry whose stones defined the walls and gardens and thrones of more than a few infamous kings. One hundred millions years and entire mountains are disassembled and tumbled to the sea.

A Photo Essay of a Funeral Service
The World Council of Churches (WCC) general secretary expressed deep sorrow over the death of Armenian Apostolic Patriarch Torkom II Manoogian, primate of the Armenian Patriarchate of Jerusalem. Torkom II passed October 12 at the age of 96.

Read the full story.

Today, I was given the honor of joining Bishop Munib Younan as his photographer, at a round table discussion with the Elders, an independent group of respected leaders who work together for peace and human rights. Founded by Nelson Mandela in 2007 and chaired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the Elders work to find solutions to some of the world’s most challenging geo- and socio-political issues.

This event was assembled in order to update the Elders organization with a current state of affairs concerning the Israeli occupation of Palestine. A number of individuals from a diverse background were present, from a former Prime Minister to representatives from the Carter Center, Just Vision, al Quds University, and Bishop Munib Younan, President of the Lutheran World Federation.

Each person who spoke of the Palestinian experience brought to the discussion a facet of living under Israeli occupation: from the challenge of simple, daily tasks, to the morbid statistics of education, low salaries and education, and the growing number of refugees, people displaced through forced removal or complete destruction of their homes.

Without Proof of Birth
One woman described how she had a number of years ago moved back to her home land from a good life in Dubai in order to grant her son an Israeli birth, only to learn after his birth he would be denied a certificate because she was married to a Palestinian man. The Israeli government explained she would need to divorce her Palestinian husband in order for her son to have an Israeli birth certificate.

She had to choose between leaving her homeland forever, or playing the game for she was already in Israel, her son without a birth certificate. She divorced her husband (on paper, not in her heart, from what I understood). But instead of being granted a birth certificate as was promised, she was denied for six and a half years. Without a birth certificate, her son was not allowed to attend school in Israel or Palestine. Her family was torn apart as she was caught in a no-win situation.

A Home Invasion
Fourteen year old Ibrihim (a name used to protect his identity) described something completely inconceivable to me, and to most who hear his story. It is so bizarre that it simply does not seem possible. If I had not already heard similar stories from an Israeli friend, I would find it difficult to immediately believe.

The Israeli government has since 1967 encouraged and supported “settlements”—illegal (according to the geo-political boundaries set in 1947 by the United Nations General Assembly) acquisition of land in the Palestinian territories. Sometimes through relatively subtle, gradual take-over, but in many instances, the overt bulldozing of entire housing complexes and family homes. In all, more than 750,000 Palestinians have been documented as fled or forced from their homes. While on paper many yet own land in the occupied territories, or even in Israel proper, they have nothing to return to or are not allowed to return at all.

In attempt to counter the Israeli occupation, there are NGOs whose function is to support the rapid reconstruction of Palestinian homes after they are knocked down, keeping the Israeli’s from claiming the land once unoccupied. They knock them down and they are rebuilt again … and again … and again.

But what is even more unbelievable is the occupation of family homes while the Palestinians yet remain there, the Israeli Settler family literally takes over a few rooms, even half the house. Sometimes, as is the case with a home in the Old City, they leave the Palestinians with but a single room or court yard, using the ancient laws of division of property by sons and then daughters to their favor, as the Palestinian family is split and no longer fully accounted for at that location.

Ibrihim describes how one half of his family home was forcibly taken over, a young couple (likely in their late twenties) moving in. At threat of police or military intervention, they are forced to share their home with unwanted, permanent guests.

The Settlers often do not work, rather, they are paid by the Israeli government to occupy this space. They make reports about the coming and going of the Palestinians, verbally accosting them and even spitting on Ibrihim’s grandmother whenever they pass. There is but one front door to enter, and a shared court yard.

Ibrihim and his parents have left, as they simply cannot live in this condition. But their grandmother remains, steadfast so as to not lose the family home.

This is not an isolated incident, rather, there are 28 such examples in Ibrihim’s home town alone. Why do they do this? Slowly, one house at a time, it is the intent of the Zionist movement to claim all of occupied Palestine for Israel, an assumed biblical heritage which ignores the Palestinians 4,000 years history on this land. After centuries of hostile take-over and more than twenty five invasions, the mandate by the U.N. is ignored and the request for State just last year denied, in part, by the United States.

Ibrihim’s own words were incredible to hear, given what he has experienced. Holding back tears, he shared with all those present at the Round Table discussion, “I do not hate the Israeli people. I do not hate the Jews. I have many Jewish friends. I do not hate them. But what these people do, I do not understand. They come into my home. My family’s home, and they yell at us every day, saying horrible, mean things. They spit on my grandmother when they pass and they tell us we do not belong. I do not–I will not hate them, but what they do is wrong.”

What I don’t understand …
On a personal note, I struggle with this at several levels. I am baffled as to how this unfolds, how this can happen. It is bizarre, surreal even. And yet, it is true, documented, time and time again, not some urban legend.

Yes, governments have for millennia committed far worse, in both historic and modern times, coordinating the destruction of properly, rape and murder of their own people. In those circumstances as with this, I ask not how a government can intentionally force strangers into a family home, but what is the psychology of those who are the ones to move in, to live there every day? How can a couple in their twenties, a time in one’s life when the world should be open to opportunity, be so filled with hatred and violent tendency that they feel ok, inside, about what they do?

In the military, young men are taught to defend at any cost, to kill without hesitation. But what kind of training did these young couples receive? What were they taught, when, and where? How were they programmed to disable that natural human tendency for compassion (even if their empathy gene is switched off ), to lose differentiation of ok versus not ok?

Peled-Elhanan, a professor of language and education at Hebrew University of Jerusalem has studied the content of Israeli school books for the past five years. Her account, “Palestine in Israeli School Books: Ideology and Propaganda in Education” describes … a racism that prepares young Israelis for their compulsory military service.

Peled-Elhanna states “One question that bothers many people is how do you explain the cruel behaviour of Israeli soldiers towards Palestinians, an indifference to human suffering, the inflicting of suffering. People ask how can these nice Jewish boys and girls become monsters once they put on a uniform. I think the major reason for that is education.”

This is not unlike the U.S. Border Patrol turning on the A/C in the dog catcher trucks in the cold winter or the heat in the dead of an Arizona summer while depriving migrant workers of water, a change of clothes, or return of their belongings. Something snaps. It simply must. At some point, humans are no longer seen as human, rather some kind of lower animal and the action is justified. This has been happening for centuries, not just here in Israel and Palestine, but on a global scale in countless thousands of conflicts and issues of imbalance throughout history: caste systems, slave trade, and apartheid to name a few.

Xenophobia is very, very real.

The conclusion I have arrived to is that in time of war, it would be far easier for me to fire a rifle than to sit in someone’s home, verbally abusing the owners and spitting in their faces. I cannot imagine what someone would have to tell me, how I would need to be programmed to do this not once, but every day for months, even years on end. It seems the power of religion can work to both heal and divide equally.

At the same time, he exemplifies the most powerful aspect of humanity while his adversaries display the worst, for even at fourteen years of age, he refuses to give into hate. He simply desires for his grandmother to be safe, to return to his home, and for his people to have a nation they can call their own.

Where does this go?
I want to be clear in stating that Jewish Setters do not in any way represent all Israelis. In fact, they are in the small minority. But they have been granted incredible power through funding (much of which comes from American citizens) and Israeli law which supports their actions.

I do not have ample understanding of what transpires here to make any sort of statement about what should or will unfold to bring this conflict to an end. I hear talk among my associates here in Palestine that without economic sanctions, a unanimous decision by the United Nations, or a third intafada—this will continue to unfold for decades more. In recent news the Christian churches in North America are calling upon Congress to investigate how U.S. military aid is used in conjunction with Israel’s occupation of Palestine. The official Jewish response was harsh and unyielding.

As the opening presenter made clear, a tourist can visit the Holy Land and unless he or she ventures into the Islamic quarter and observes Jewish children escorted under armed guard to and from school, or ventures into Hebron and other heavily occupied cities, it is not obvious what is transpiring. The cameras, the military preparedness, the tension right under the surface is not something one gathers from a few days in Jerusalem, and certainly not in Western Israel.

The relative subtlety of the Israeli effort on a daily basis is interrupted only by those seemingly “news worthy” events—rock throwing returned by gun fire, outbreaks at checkpoints, and the occasional story of a United States manufactured bulldozer destroying Palestinian homes—makes for the perpetuation of a methodical ethnic cleansing from an ancient Palestinian land.

There are thousands of individuals here from around the world, working through the United Nations, NGOs, schools, churches, and a variety of volunteer and humanitarian aide organizations—all trying to make a difference. It is my hope that while any one organization is not likely to change history, together, gradual, slow change will occur.