{"id":37927,"date":"2024-08-26T09:06:03","date_gmt":"2024-08-26T16:06:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=37927"},"modified":"2024-08-30T11:49:35","modified_gmt":"2024-08-30T18:49:35","slug":"how-little-i-knew-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/how-little-i-knew-2\/","title":{"rendered":"How Little I Knew"},"content":{"rendered":"

Without really knowing why I remember growing up hearing people say that there will never be peace in the Middle East. I knew that Israel as a nation was re-established after WWII and that there had been conflict over the years that resulted from the Promised Land<\/em> being given back to Israel.\u00a0 I heard terms such as Palestine, The Seven Day War, and the Camp David Peace Accords, and names such as Yassir Arafat, Benjamin Netanyahu, Hamas and Hezbollah.\u00a0 However, to be honest it wasn\u2019t until after October 7, 2023, that I really took time to begin to understand the history.<\/p>\n

Martin Bunton\u2019s book The Palestinian-Israeli Conflict: A Very Short Introduction <\/em>allowed me to better understand things such as why this isn\u2019t just a religious issue and how this started before 1947\/48.[1]<\/a> I was very unaware of the history of the area during and after the Ottoman Empire and how Jews had been treated in Europe prior to WWII.<\/p>\n

Treatment in Europe<\/strong><\/p>\n

Burton suggests that the Palestinian-Israeli conflict has been evolving over the past 120 years, referring to first Zionist Congress held in Basel Switzerland in August 1897.[2]<\/a>\u00a0 Burton references Theodor Herzl and his view that \u201ceven an assimilated Jew could never be accepted as an equal citizen in Europe.\u201d[3]<\/a>\u00a0 Besides the Holocaust during WWII, I was not consciously aware of the antisemitism that exited throughout Europe.\u00a0 I guess I should have been aware given that it is addressed in Fiddler on the Roof.[4]<\/a>\u00a0 I believe this lack assimilation and acceptance is a foundational concept to understand. Once a person realizes how the Jews were not accepted in Europe, One may realize that due to their covenant with God and the lifestyle God called them to observe, the Jews have really never been truly accepted by any culture as seen throughout the Scriptures.[5]<\/a><\/p>\n

History of Palestine prior to 1947<\/strong><\/p>\n

I really never understood how Britain gained control of the Ottoman Empire after WWI and broke the area up into different nations.\u00a0 Bunton discusses how Britain\u2019s handling of the Palestinian area led to the Palestinians never being able to create their own form of government, helping create a lack of identity and power for the Palestinian people. [6]<\/a><\/p>\n

I always assumed that the Palestinian-Israeli conflict was primarily about religion and Israel\u2019s claim to the Promised Land.\u00a0 I was surprised to read how the right to religious sites such as Jerusalem was not a primary focus.\u00a0 It makes sense that the primary focus was to obtain land that was able to sustain agriculture[7]<\/a>\u00a0 I also never gave it much thought as to what happened to those who were already living in the land prior to the late 1940\u2019s.\u00a0 I was not naive enough to picture the land sitting empty just waiting for Israel\u2019s return, but I never really considered how this created a refugee crisis with 750,000 Palestinians having to relocate.[8]<\/a><\/p>\n

As I write this post, Columbia University\u2019s president has announced her resignation due to how she and the University handled the protests regarding the war in Gaza.[9]<\/a>\u00a0 The rates of Antisemitism have risen substantially in the past few years with almost 24% of those surveyed believing 6 or more anti-Jewish tropes.[10]<\/a> At the same time, anti-Palestinian and Anti-Muslim discrimination in the United States also saw a substantial increase, over 180% more complaints received in the final months of 2023.[11]<\/a>\u00a0 Given this, how am I personally handling the Israeli, Palestinian, and Middle East conflicts?\u00a0 I am trying to educate others about the history of the people groups and focus on praying for everyone involved in the conflict.\u00a0 Among my Christian friends, I try to remind them that we have Christian brothers and sisters that are suffering and being killed in Palestine due to this conflict.\u00a0 I remind them that we cannot solely focus on one ethnic group or nationality at the expense of Christian brothers and sisters.\u00a0 After reading Bunton\u2019s book, I have tried to gain empathy for both sides of the conflict by bringing it closer to home.\u00a0 I have pictured the United Nations giving Native Americans back all their historic lands across the United States and any non-Native American resident of the United States who chooses to stay must reside in the state of Virginia or Washington.\u00a0 I then ask the following questions.\u00a0 Would we as American citizens be any less angry than a Palestinian?\u00a0 Think of what happened on January 6, 2021, would we behave any differently if our<\/em> land was being taken from us?\u00a0 What about the Native Americans who had been ousted from their lands, not accepted as full citizens and want a place to live where they can flourish?\u00a0 Could I (we) blame them for wanting their historic land back and wanting to live in peace?<\/p>\n

This isn\u2019t about who is right and who is wrong, neither side is totally innocent.\u00a0 We need to pray for both sides and pray that compromise can happen.\u00a0 We need to pray that both sides can recognize each other\u2019s right to live in the land regardless of beliefs and backgrounds.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> Martin Bunton, The Palestinian-Israel Conflict: A Very Short History, Oxford, UK: Oxford Press, 2013.<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Bunton, 1<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> Bunton, 1.<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a> Isabel de Andrade Bezerra Menezes,\u00a0 \u201cThe Historical Background of \u2018Fiddler on the Roof,\u2019\u00a0 The Odyssey, https:\/\/www.theodysseyonline.com\/the-historical-background-of-fiddler-on-the-roof<\/a>, November 29, 2016.<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a>[5] For example, I am thinking about things such as Haman\u2019s desire to execute the Jews in the book of Esther or how the media portrays how the Romans treated the Jews in various films.<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a> Bunton, 23-26.<\/p>\n

[7]<\/a> Bunton, 10-11, 26-27<\/p>\n

[8]<\/a> Bunton, 54-58<\/p>\n

[9]<\/a> Max Matza, \u201cColumbia University President resigns after Gaza Protest Turmoil, BBC, https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/articles\/cy8431ejnk5o<\/a>, August 15, 2024.<\/p>\n

[10]<\/a> Anti-Defamation League, Antisemitic Attitudes in America 2024, https:\/\/www.adl.org\/resources\/report\/antisemitic-attitudes-america-2024<\/a>, February 29, 2024.<\/p>\n

[11]<\/a> Times of Israel, \u201cAnti-Muslim, anti-Palestinian discrimination in the US rose 180% after Oct. 7,\u201d https:\/\/www.timesofisrael.com\/anti-muslim-anti-palestinian-discrimination-in-the-us-rose-180-after-oct-7\/<\/a>, January 29, 2024.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Without really knowing why I remember growing up hearing people say that there will never be peace in the Middle East. I knew that Israel as a nation was re-established after WWII and that there had been conflict over the years that resulted from the Promised Land being given back to Israel.\u00a0 I heard terms […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":200,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3222,2967],"class_list":["post-37927","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-bunton","tag-dlgp03","cohort-dlgp03"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37927","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/200"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37927"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37927\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37985,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37927\/revisions\/37985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37927"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37927"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37927"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}