Ghetto Bethlehem- {Bethlehem trip- part one)

Well, I added a ton of posts because I wasn't sure I would be able to blog at all this week... you just never can be sure about the state of internet while traveling... BUT as it turns out, the Bethlehem Bible College that is housing us, does in fact, have wireless internet.

So I suppose all of my franctic blogging was all for naught, friends. Anyway, if you get super bored, there are many new posts here in the month of December.

I was quite worried about our flights (see previous post) but in the end, it all worked out. Some nice people traded seats so that our little family could all sit in the same row. And even more importantly, Cohen was asleep within the first hour and continued sleeping for the next 8 hours of our 12 hour flight. Shawn and I were so relieved that we didn't even mind that our seats didn't recline. Everything seems wonderful when you are expecting to deal with a shreiking, squirming, growling 7 month old and then instead you get a smiley, peacefully, deep sleeping one! He woke up this morning and spent the rest of the flight flirting with two young Jewish girls seated near us. A few people, upon exiting the plane, even said "we didn't even know there was a baby sitting by us!" We are so proud- our little traveler. Of course, this whole experience is making us think 'man, its no problem to travel with little ones' which I am sure will backfire on us whenever we con ourselves into having more.

Or maybe we'll just remember how he responds to jet lag and decide travels must be somewhat limited. When it was time for bed last night here it was lunchtime at home. I nursed Cohen and we turned out the light. He went to sleep- magic! And then he woke up and the magic was gone. He shreiked and screamed until I put the light on. I tried to nurse him and get him to lie down...he looked at us like we were nuts. Eventually somewhere around 3am, we officially gave up and let him play with toys on the bed between us while we tried to get some sleep. He went back to sleep around 4, Shawn decided to get up after anyway, and me? I decided to SLEEP.

Ethnographic Media/Bearing Fruit is a really cool group of people. The sun came out this morning and we had a little more strength to give sustained attention to learning about the members of the crew and the man who the documentary is centered around. To say its been a day of learning, would be an understatement.

I suppose I consider myself a fairly educated and aware person overall. But I have to admit that when we first got the call that we were invited to go to Bethlehem, I thought 'wow Israel!' when of course, Bethlehem is in Palestine. That gives you an idea of my ignorance about the middle east even from a geographic perspective- nevermind the politics. My thinking about the tension between the Palestinians and Israelis was simple: these people have been fighting forever and its not likely to change anytime soon..and please? the Gaza strip? is that strip of desert worth fighting over? And I suppose if I had to take sides (not that I really had)I would've sided with Israel on the simple basis of their being God's chosen people. I think probably a lot of Christians think similarly while being mostly ignorant like myself. We hear little bits and peices on the news but I hate to say that even Fox news (widely perferred by believers) is not spin-free.

Sammie, the man whose life is the focus of this documentary, said something tonight that I think is very true. He said, when people come here for a week, they think they could write on one page what would fix the tensions here. When they've stayed a month, its grown to a pamphlet. In six months, the pamphlet becomes a booklet and by a year, its become a book. The more information one learns, the more frayed and varied and difficult the solutions seem.

Sammieis a Palestinian Christian whose family was kicked out of their homes in Jerusalem 40 years ago and they have been considered refugees ever since. Educated in the US with a masters degree in the psychology of non-violence, Sammie came back to Palestine and started The Holy Land Trust. Its main objective is to teach non-violent mindset and procedures and to encourage travel to the area for outsiders to become educated on the issues that exist here.

Dinner tonight with Sammie and his family (wife and daughters Lu Lu 5yrs and Laraina 5 months)helped to shed light on all of the scenes we had soaked up today as we drove around Bethlehem. Most of our day was focused on seeing the wall that is being erected all around the borders of Israel and is actually walling in the tiny area called the Palestinian territories. The wall is enormous. I cannot rightly explain to you just how HUGE it is. And almost every inch of it is covered in graffiti. Its that very artistic and thought-provoking graffiti that inspired the name of this documentary 'Ghetto Bethlehem'. Sayings cover the walls, asking Israel to remember that "thou shalt not steal still applies" and reminding them that the are now doing to the Palestinians the very thing that was done to them- taking their homes, not giving them a land, and occupation. The art is almost as bone chilling. The one that sticks out most in my mind is a huge dove with an olive branch in its mouth, wearing a bullet proof vest.



There were so many things I didn't understand... I guess I just thought that these were two countries, equal in power and resources, that were fighting one another. The reality is much different. Palestine does not have a military of any kind. And now they are only fighting to occupy 8% of the land and be able to govern themselves. Its not quite the picture I had in my mind. Even as we looked at an arial view of the wall being built and our guide pointed out the land beyond, saying 'this is our land. we still own parcels and houses but we cannot build it. Israel will not give us permits. We are only allowed to 'visit' our land between 6am and 6pm. And even then, we can only go when the guard shows up to unlock the gate, which is rare.' Even then, the thought in the forefront of my mind was simply 'this is half the story'.

Tonight as Sammie went back and explained to us the history, I struggled to hold on that thought. So in case you know as little as I did, I will tell you just a few things. Until 1948, all of this land was Palestine. Jews and Palestinians lived together here. There was tension, but it was all Palestine. Because of that tension, the UN came in and divided the land, creating two countries and giving Israel their own land. Although the Jews constituted 20% of the population, they were given 55% of the land, which naturally was unacceptable to the the arab community. This is when things heated up. The outcome was that eventually Israel actually took more than the UN gave them and ended up with 80% of the land and now the Palestinian territories actually make up only 40% of the rest of that 20%...do the math, that's 8% of the total. And that's what they are fighting for. Yes, its the west bank and gaza strip- land we can't imagine fighting over, but its all they have. And there is a fight over Jerusalem, a city both groups lay claim to. I guess Jerusalem is actually east and west Jerusalem- two cities. Samie seems to think Israel should have one city and Palestine the other...without borders, but who knows if that's possible now?

One thing is for sure, many people here have been refuges over 60 years now and living in horrid conditions. In the refugee camps (there are 5 in Bethlehem)as many as 50 people live in one flat that's usually less than 1000sqft. Animals and people co-exist in filth. Its very sad. When the Palestinians were forced out of Jerusalem, 800,000 people were displaced. And SAmmie is right to say that once conflict is over, people return home (think: Bosnia) but no one has returned home here. And however you see it, there is something not right with that.

Tonight part of our dinner was filmed...strange. You definitely find yourself thinking more about how wide you open your mouth to take a bite than you do the conversation. So luckily they only filmed a small portion. Once we were without lights and cameras, the conversation flowed more easily and we were all more relaxed. It began to occur to me, that along with my ignorance, I had made the assumption that Israel is Jewish and Christian and Palestine is Muslim. But the lines are that easily drawn. Many Muslim Palestinians live in Israel and (although declining) the Christian population in Palestine was in the recent past over 30%! These are a people with a shared history and in many ways, a shared DNA. Sammie told us even though he's Palestinian and Arab, a genetic test he had done showed his markers to be 80% Jewish...

Anyway I asked Sammie if Palestinian and Israeli Christians identify more with their faith or their nationality? He said they identify themselves more as Palestinian or Israeli than Christian.

That stuck out to me. Its the same issue I have with a lot of American believers. We tend to identify ourselves politically more than we identify with our faith. I mean, a lot of Christians think that its Christian to be Republican when Jesus didn't even affliate himself politically during a very political time while he was on earth. He was asked political questions,people tried to nail him down. But instead of addressing the issues or taking sides, he answered with questions that pointed to deeper realities. He showed that he didn't come to fix the systems in place, but to usher in a COMPLETELY NEW mindset...a Kingdom mindset.

At my church in Ohio, Pastor Ricks (an african american man in a very small, rural, mostly white town) said something one Sunday that has stuck with me. He said he doesn't think of himself as African American. That he doesn't identify himself primarly by his race or gender or political standings or even by a denomination. He said simply "I am a Christian who happens to be African American, who happens to be American, who happens to be male...whatever label society gives me, I only have one identity for myself and that is Child of God."

I have been thinking about that since we left dinner. I should be sleeping while Cohen is (in case it doesn't last! *grin*) but I am up thinking...wondering...

I have been here only a day and a half now, so I should only have one sentence to write about the situation, according to Sammie's saying. And with the words of Paul running through my mind "there is neither, slave nor free, male nor female, Jew nor Gentile", I think the sentence I would pen would be question something like this...

How different could this war be if belivers in both countries really heard and obeyed the command 'love your neighbor as yourself' or 'bless those who persecute you'? What would happen if Christian Israelis took literally when Jesus said "if someone asks for your coat, give him your tunic also"? if the Palestinian believers focused on 'love covers a multitude of sins' (even land-stealing)? I wonder what it would change if the main identity of believers in this region was 'Child of God' rather than 'oppressed Israeli' or 'victim Palestinian'? I wonder what it would look like for the Kingdom mindset to be spread on both sides through believers who refuse to become more politically minded than things-above-focused?

Okay that's more than a sentence..*grin* And its just a thought. It certainly doesn't mean I think people don't ahve the right to protest or resist or fight for what is theirs...and really, Sammie is encouraging thoughtful non-violence and a coming together..peaceful coexistance...

Anyway its what is on my mind as I prepare for bed half way around the world in a place full of boxy stone houses and olive trees, and the best most amazing hummus you've ever tasted. (cohen was a big fan..so that's now 3 foods he likes- bananas, avocados, and now hummus...good palate so far!)

Good night friends. More from Bethlehem in the days to come!

KAte