Province I Convocation Participants Offer a Glimpse of the Crisis in the Middle East
Episcopal News Service. November 29, 1990 [90315]
James Thrall, Communications Officer for the Diocese of Connecticut
The two men huddle over a shared meal in the middle of a noisy cafeteria. One is a Muslim Palestinian, the other director of a Zionist peace organization. They have been friends for several years, ever since they met at a lecture in Jerusalem. Later they would argue heatedly about the future of the Middle East, but for now they are able to share a specially prepared kosher meal.
Yehezkel Landau of Oz veShalom (Religious Zionists for Strength and Peace) and Mustafa Abu-Sway, acting president of the Islamic Society of Boston, will speak to 250 Episcopalians attending the New England province's annual convocation, looking for an answer to the convocation's theme question, "In God's name, what's happening in the Holy Land?" But for now they enjoy "a little sabbath space with kosher food which he can eat," said Landau. "On a lot of points we would agree," he said.
And yet Abu-Sway never gives up trying to convince his friend that total Islamic rule over the Holy Land and most of the Middle East is the answer to the divisions between Arabs and Jews.
Landau, meanwhile, would like Abu-Sway to understand the religious need of the Jewish people to live in their own land under their own rule.
While there were moments of tension in the discussions, "even the sharing of grievances and pain is done in the spirit of reconciliation," observed Landau. "That gives me hope."
The Rev. Canon Gene Robinson, executive secretary of the province, said the event was an outgrowth of his involvement in the 1989 Episcopal Church delegation to the Middle East led by Patti Browning, wife of Presiding Bishop Edmond Browning.
"The tragedy that is taking place across the Atlantic is heavy on my heart," Robinson said. "I hope it will be heavy on your hearts as well by the time the conference is over."
Since no conference could present more than a fraction of the viewpoints current on the Middle East, the three speakers selected were moderates who at least agree that Israelis and Palestinians must work together for a solution, Robinson said.
Taking what was probably the most extreme stance, Abu-Sway based his call for a vast Islamic state in the Middle East ruling Muslim, Jew, and Christian. If a Muslim is truly following the teachings of the Koran, AbuSway explained, "he would have to be just to the Jew, and to the Christian and all people."
The Koran includes writings about both the Jewish prophets and Jesus Christ, Abu-Sway said. He pointed out that, in over a millennium of Islamic rule in the Middle East, Jews fared far better than they did through most of the history of Christianity in Europe.
With the occupation of their land, however, Palestinians have suffered a systematic attack on "our identity, our culture, our history," Abu-Sway added. He warned that an increasing number of people would like to "put the Palestinians on buses and drop them beyond the Jordanian border."
Palestinians who became refugees in the wake of the 1948 war that led to the creation of the State of Israel are still "waiting to go back home," said Abu-Sway. Many still have their old door keys because "they believe their old houses are still there, and someday they will return."
More common among Palestinians, the speakers agreed, was the call from the Rev. Canon Riah Abu El-Assal, rector of Christ Church, Nazareth, for two separate coexisting states. "The only secure borders for Israel are reconciled neighbors, and the closest neighbors are the Palestinians," he said. "Until Israeli Jews are liberated from their fear, Palestinians will not be liberated from their occupation."
Describing himself as an "Israeli Palestinian Anglican Christian Arab," Abu El-Assal said the fact that there are Palestinian Christians comes as a surprise to many Americans. Squeezed between the Jews and Muslims, Christians are a dwindling community in severe danger of disappearing from the Holy Land, he warned. Calling them the "living stones of Palestine," Abu El-Assal urged the audience to visit and support the remaining Christians rather than become preoccupied with the "holy stones" of religious sites. "For God's sake, see to it that we continue to be there," he said.
"There is enough space in the land for everyone to be fruitful and blessed," said Landau in his support for two states. Both Arab and Jew, however, have "demonized the other," he said, seeing only "what they have done to us, and what they have made us do to them."
Jews need their own state if they are to be fulfilled as a cultural and religious people, Landau argued. That identity, however, includes being a "priestly people" who will sacrifice even part of the land to live in peace with their neighbors, he said. "We need enough lard under our feet to be who we are called to be, but not at the expense of the Palestinian people."
Landau said there were Israelis who are "taking retroactive responsibility for what was done in our name -- the expulsion of Palestinians in the course of a war for our survival." For example, Landau and his wife, Dalia, are working with Palestinians to convert the house where she grew up -- a house owned by a Palestinian family before the 1948 war -- into a kindergarten for Palestinian children and a meeting center for Jews and Palestinians.
Though not the main topic of the convocation, the invasion of Kuwait by Saddam Hussein and the military buildup in Saudi Arabia by the United States and other nations prompted some of the sharper exchanges.
In opening the event, the Rt. Rev. Arthur E. Walmsley, bishop of Connecticut and province president, called the choice of topic "uncanny," given the subsequent developments in the Persian Gulf.
"The gulf crisis confirmed a very nasty thing -- the double standard of the Western powers on the Middle East," said Abu El-Assal. The world's concern over the occupation of Kuwait -- where there is oil -- should be matched by concern over Israel's occupation of Palestine, he said. President George Bush should issue a declaration supporting the self-determination of all people, including the Kuwaitis and the Palestinians, Abu El-Assal said.
Conversely, Landau said that the actions of Saddam Hussein give pause to Jews trying to develop trust of the Arabs. "When they see one Arab country gobble up another Arab neighbor, they must ask, 'What will they do to us?'" he said. "It is reinforcing partisan preconceptions and fears." Given Hussein's mass murder of Iranians and Kurds in his own country, what is needed, Landau said, is "an Iraqi Dietrich Bonhoeffer who will take part in an assassination attempt."
Landau's suggestion brought an angry response from Abu El-Assal, who also attacked Landau's assertion that, even in the event of a Palestinian state, Israel would have to retain control of anti-aircraft radar sites on the Samarian hills within Palestinian territory. The sites would be needed, Landau said, as protection against an air attack on Israel from the east. Their continued discussion, however, led Landau to publicly change his position when both men agreed there may be other technological answers such as intelligencegathering satellites.
The exchange was "the high point of the conference," observed Mary Matthew of Grace Church, Amherst, Massachusetts. "That kind of discussion is what is needed in the Holy Land, and they went through the process before our very eyes."
The difference of viewpoints made the conference a powerful learning experience, but offered no easy solutions, said Ruth Hooker, also from Grace Church in Amherst. "I like the fact we are given so much information," she said.
"I never had a Muslim give his point of view before," agreed her husband, Richard Hooker. "I would hope that at home we would get a dialogue going."
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