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June 2000
Dear Family and Friends,
A poster hanging in the stairwell of the Middle East Council
of Churches’ main compound in Gaza City, Gaza, contains a
quote attributed to Archbishop Desmond Tutu that reads: "I
am puzzled about which Bible people are reading when they suggest
(that) religion and politics don’t mix." After almost
five years of living here in the Holy Land, I am just as puzzled
as Archbishop Tutu! Perhaps nowhere else on earth is this statement
more pertinent than it is to the Holy Land. And perhaps nowhere
else is there a greater clash of pieties than in this land we
call "holy"!
In early October, I co-hosted a delegation of 24 Presbyterian
women from across the United States. These women were part of
a global exchange whose theme was entitled "No Longer Strangers."
They traveled to Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Egypt, Israel and to
the Palestinian areas of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. They came
to see, listen, and share with women and men of the Middle East.
Their nearly month-long journey ended in Detroit, Michigan, where
they de-briefed about their Middle East experience. The culmination
of this exchange will take place this July when women and men
from the Middle East will be invited to join Presbyterian women
at their churchwide gathering in Louisville, Kentucky.
In late October, Israel opened the "safe passage" route
between the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, four years after it
had agreed to do so. The opening of this "passageway"
was intended to allow a greater freedom of movement for Palestinians
wishing to visit one another from these two regions, separated
by a distance of only 40 kilometers. Since the signing of the
Declaration of Principles (DOP) in September of 1993, both the
Israeli and Palestinian sides have viewed the West Bank and the
Gaza Strip as "a single territorial unit, whose integrity
will be preserved during the interim period." In the months
following the opening of this passageway, however, the freedom
of movement of Palestinians continues to be limited by Israeli
military authorities, so much so that more than 5,000 Palestinians
have been forbidden to use this "safe passage" route.
In November, following months of anxiety and tension over a disputed
site slated for the construction of a new mosque near Nazareth’s
Church of the Annunciation, the churches of the Holy Land announced
that they would close their doors in a two-day protest. At issue
was a small parcel of land not far from the Basilica of the Annunciation,
a modern edifice built over the site where, according to Christian
tradition, the angel Gabriel appeared to Mary and told her that
she would conceive a son, and would call him Emmanuel—"God
with us."
The Israeli government, in its attempts to compete with the Bethlehem
2000 Project, introduced Nazareth 2000 as its own initiative,
designed to attract Christian tourists (and tourist dollars!)
to this city that is most often overlooked and disregarded on
the tourist track. The Nazareth municipality decided to build
a Venetian-style plaza on a corner plot of land that the Israeli
government claimed belonged to the city, not far from the church
in Nazareth. The plaza was proposed in order to accommodate thousands
of Christian tourists expected to converge on Nazareth in the
millennial year. However, Muslims in Nazareth claimed the property
belonged to the Islamic Waqf or Muslim Religious Trust, and announced
plans for construction of a new mosque with a minaret that would
rival in height the magnificent cupola of the Church of the Annunciation,
which soars some 55 meters in the air. A Muslim holy site—the
grave of Shihab el-Din, the nephew of Saladin (the Muslim leader
who defeated the crusaders at the Battle of the Horns of Hittin
in 1187)—is located on this property. The Muslim response
to the proposed "piazza" was to erect a protest/prayer
tent on the disputed plot of land. Ultimately, the Israeli government
resolved to allow construction of the mosque.
Church leaders attempted to reason with Israeli officials not
to allow the mosque to be built, citing promises made by the government
that the status quo in the city would be maintained. They also
viewed Israeli reasoning over permitting the mosque to be built
as rewarding violence, since the government’s decision was
made following riots in Nazareth in April.
Eventually the Vatican got involved, and berated Israel for its
handling of the incident. There were even rumors circulating that
the pope’s planned pilgrimage to the Holy Land in March of
2000 would be canceled.
On November 22 and 23, churches in the cities of Jerusalem, Nazareth
and Bethlehem, in addition to churches at major holy sites throughout
the Holy Land, remained closed, much to the chagrin and disappointment
of visiting pilgrims and tourists. This move was aimed at voicing
the churches’ displeasure, not by reason of the building
of the mosque per say, but rather over the way in which Israeli
authorities had handled the entire affair.
With the approach of the Christmas season, the churches again
threatened to close their doors unless the Israeli government
backtracked on its decision to allow construction of the mosque
to begin. Nazareth, a city that for years had been known for its
Palestinian Christian and Muslim coexistence, had lapsed into
a predicament that, at best, could have been dubbed one unholy
mess!
Regards,
Douglas Dicks
The 2000 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 139
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