Faith In Public Life - Blogging Faith

Faith Blogs Weigh In: Violence in the Middle East

As violence in Lebanon escalates and the goals of an immediate or sustainable ceasefire are debated by international players, religion and politics bloggers are offering their own opinions of the crisis:

An ongoing debate on Street Prophets has surfaced between Pastor Dan and JCHFleetguy regarding the timing of a ceasefire. Pastor Dan contends that the U.S. intervention in the situation thus far has been indicative of the Bush administration’s limited ideological worldview and inability to understand a conflict only from the “I�? perspective rather than the “Thou�?. This limitation has led the U.S. to stall an immediate ceasefire, which he contends is essential to ultimate peace.

JCHFleetguy agrees with the identification of America’s ideological blinders but agrees with the course taken by Secretary Rice. Certain events, including Lebaneese reform to take control of its territory, must occur before a real ceasefire is even possible. The U.S. must help to secure an ultimately secure and nonviolent future, not one that returns to turmoil in a year.

Other bloggers have chimed in the discussion, such as Asbury Park who asserts that continuing violence cannot end violence but only beget itself. Quarkstomper claims that U.S. involvement in this situation is consistent with the “All or Nothing�? attitude that it has shown previously.

Progressive Christian contrasts two articles written about US options with regard to Israel, Lebanon, and Hezbollah. One is written by Jim Lobe at Anti-War.com and the other by Steven Erlanger of the NY Times. He believes the former astutely places America’s green-light support of Israel as detrimental to wider international diplomacy and the latter article resorts to an unconstructive labeling of “radical Islam�? in assigning blame for the situation.

Progressive Christian also posts an entry that criticism of Israel’s actions should not be taken as Anti-Semitic and that progressivism requires analysis among allies. A thread regarding a similar subject is raised by Mik Moore at JSpot regarding suspected Anti-Semitic sentiments surrounding the Connecticut Democratic Senate Primary and Sen. Joe Lieberman.

Progressive Christians Uniting and FaithfulAmerica.org have both used their blogs to solicit signatories for a letter calling upon President Bush, Secretary Rice, and Congressional Leaders to press for an immediate ceasefire. Progressive Christians Uniting cites the unjust provocation by Hezbollah as well as a disproportionately violent response from Israel; they also express a concern that American Neo-Cons will use this situation to renew their campaign for forced control of the Middle East.

On Huffington Post, Peter Laarman questions the duplicitous support given to Israel by many Christians enthused by the escalating violence which they believe to be an indicator of Jesus’ second coming. He writes:

We should never forget the huge numbers of Christian Zionists in this country (and doubtless in the Bush Administration) who are enthralled by this latest drama and are feverishly consulting the books of Daniel and Revelation to see whether this might be "it" or at least a prelude to the Big One on the plains of Megiddo. Although anti-Semitic at their core, these Christians are reflexively, even vehemently, pro-Israel because unless that Third Temple gets built where the Dome of the Rock is now, there's no Second Coming.

Apocalypse-Bob echoes this concern on I Am a Christian Too. He says that this “Left Behind�? mentality infiltrates our foreign policy and translates into a hidden aversion to lasting peace in the area. Bob quotes an article from the Toledo Blade that demonstrates the seriousness of the Rapture Christians.

Jeremy Burton at Jspot.org takes a step back from the situation, and says Jews must be careful not to let this situation distract attention from the other numerous threats to the common good. He intends:

“to keep reminding the Jewish community about all the rest of our agenda. Its our mission, even in a moment of crisis in Israel, to never lose sight of our role as a powerful force and voice and as a reliable ally and partner to a progressive agenda in this country�?

Posted by Dave Baron on July 27, 2006 04:39 PM | Link | del.icio.us | Digg

Comments

http://www.forward.com/articles/8206

Liberal Churches Slam Israel
July 28, 2006

As Israel presses for more time to pursue its military campaigns against Hezbollah and Hamas, liberal American churches are pushing hard for a cease-fire and are criticizing Israeli actions in Lebanon and in Gaza.

Late last week, officials representing some dozen mainline Protestant and other, mostly liberal denominations sent a pair of letters to President Bush, calling for an immediate cessation of hostilities in Lebanon and suggesting that Israel’s actions in Gaza lack “proportion.�? Individual denominations and Christian groups also have issued their own statements in response to the current crisis, many criticizing Israeli actions as excessive or disproportionate — sometimes using very strong language .

“Pretty uniformly the churches in this country have been calling for an immediate end to the violence and a cease-fire, and many of the Jewish groups are willing to let the hostilities continue to root out Hezbollah,�? said Antonios Kireopoulos, associate general secretary of international affairs and peace at the National Council of Churches USA, an umbrella group that includes the mainline denominations. “We see the harm that’s coming to the Lebanese community in general. While we certainly are against terrorism, and certainly condemn the attacks of Hezbollah into Israel, we see that the response of Israel is so damaging to the people and to the infrastructure in Lebanon that we see it as more destabilizing.�?

The so-called mainline Protestant churches — liberal and centrist Lutherans, Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Congregationalists, Baptists and others — have long been critical of Israel’s actions toward the Palestinians as well as of American foreign policy in the Middle East. These denominations often have strong ties to Palestinian and Lebanese Christians through their missionary work and through sister churches in the region. The latest hostilities in Lebanon and Gaza came just as Jewish groups had been breathing sighs of relief, as they appeared to have blunted campaigns within the mainline churches to divest from Israel.

Mark Pelavin, director of Reform Judaism’s Commission on Interreligious Affairs, said that the mainline churches “at some level don’t get terrorism, don’t understand the impact that terrorism has on Israeli life.�?

He faulted the churches’ recent statements for being insufficiently sympathetic to Israel’s predicament. “I’d like them to recognize Hezbollah for what it is, which is a terrorist organization — something that does in fact need to be dismantled, disarmed, defanged, made something that is not a threat,�? said Pelavin, who has been heavily involved in dialogue with mainline Protestants.

The National Council of Churches and the allied Church World Service issued a July 14 statement that said: “Any hope for peace, itself a miracle in the midst of occupation, was stifled with Israel’s missile strike on Gaza and the death of innocent Palestinians. Any chance of reconciliation was hindered by the retributive attacks and kidnapping of an Israeli soldier by Hamas. Any call for restraint was ignored with disproportionate retaliations by Israel. Any plea for reason was cast aside with the capture of two more Israeli soldiers by Hezbollah. Any prayer for an end to this escalation of hostilities was silenced with the Israeli incursions into Lebanon, the subsequent shelling of Haifa and Beirut, and the death of more and more civilians.�?

Some of the harshest criticism of Israel has come from the 1.3-million-member United Church of Christ. In a “Pastoral Letter to Palestinian Friends and Partners,�? the denomination’s president, the Rev. John Thomas, denounced the “massive destruction�? of Palestinian infrastructure, decried Israel’s separation barrier and condemned the “complicity�? of the American government in the sanctions against the Palestinian Authority, which “have caused a financial strangulation of vital political, educational and humanitarian institutions.�?

In his letter to the Palestinians — which drew an angry response from the Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center — Thomas also criticized “many Christians�? in the United States “who see only Israel’s need for security, who focus only on a few terrorist acts which you yourselves condemn,�? and he complained, “Many in our own churches are subject to intense lobbying by Jewish groups demonizing the Palestinian community.�? He proclaimed the UCC’s “readiness to use our church’s economic resources, including the possibility of divestment, to press for an end to the occupation and to support peacemaking and the Palestinian community.�?

The UCC also posted a churchwide prayer for Middle East peace on its Web site that included the following passage: “While leaders in Tel Aviv and Damascus, Tehran, Washington, and southern Lebanon pander to ancient fears, claim the mantle of righteous victim, and pursue their little empires in the name of gods of their own devising, the people of Lebanon and northern Israel are made captive to fear.�?

The Reform movement’s Pelavin criticized the prayer’s grouping of the governments of Israel and the United States with the leaderships of Syria, Iran and Hezbollah. “It feels not unlike the old ‘Sesame Street’ game, ‘Which of these things doesn’t belong here?’�? Pelavin said. “Two of those countries are vibrant, healthy democracies.�?

International and foreign church bodies also have been critical of Israeli actions. Pope Benedict XVI said that “neither terrorist acts or reprisals, especially when they have such tragic consequences on the civilian population, can be justified.�? The general secretary of the World Council of Churches, the Rev. Samuel Kobia, said, “In Lebanon, Gaza, the West Bank and Israel as well as Iraq, no amount of fear and anger can justify retaliatory targeting of homes, bombing of communities and destruction of a nation’s infrastructure.�? Orthodox Archbishop Christodoulos, head of Greece’s national church, warned Israel: “Do not provoke our consciences. Do not feed the world condemnation against you. It is not in your interest…. Fear God’s wrath.�?

Posted by: Gary Aknos | July 28, 2006 02:14 PM

Thanks for posting that article Gary. I think the headline writer is a bit over-zealous, but aside from that it's an interesting piece. I'm sure the churches described in it and the bloggers Dave linked to are all struggling to balance their condemnations of terrorism with the need to speak out for peace.

It's unbelievably frustrating that after burning so much international credibility over Iraq, America is unable and unwilling to excercise the kind of restraining and reassuring role that it should play in the current crisis.

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