Apr 12, 2015 | Jerusalem Notebook, Jews and the Jewish State

Sundown on Friday, April 10 marked the end of 2015’s weeklong Passover season in Jerusalem and beyond. It was a momentous Jewish celebration that celebrated the ancient Israelites’ miraculous journey of deliverance from enslavement in Egypt and their new beginning in Israel, the Land of Promise.

Passover (Pesach) was significant in biblical times when it, along with the Pentecost (Shavuot) and Tabernacles (Sukkot) feasts, was designated as a feast that called for pilgrimage to Jerusalem.

Passover’s venerable tradition also serves to sanctify the family as the center of Jewish life. The Jews left Egypt family by family. And they are celebrating their freedom today family by family. The liturgy at Passover is not recited at the synagogue, but at the family Passover dinner – the Seder.

I have been included in several memorable Seders during my time in Israel. The first of these was strictly Orthodox and religious; others varied in their degree of formality, and one was not very religious at all. I don’t recall the names of everyone at every table and I don’t remember every special food or of the exact sequence in which they appeared. But all of these occasions touched me deeply. Despite their variations, they provided vivid impressions of the warmth and faithfulness of Judaism’s family rituals and of the timeless story of freedom that still echoes around the world during Passover.

The Seder focuses on Exodus 12, which teaches us about the Jews’ plight, God’s calling and ordination of Moses, Moses’ confrontations with a stone-hearted Pharaoh, the 10 plagues that were visited upon the Egyptians and – the most horrifying judgment of all – the death of Egypt’s firstborn. These plagues eventually changed the mind of Pharaoh, at least temporarily.

But as soon as the huge procession of Jews headed toward Egypt’s borderlands, Pharaoh had second thoughts. Why should he give up his invaluable work force? Disastrously, he ordered his army to pursue the fleeing slaves. The frantic soldiers tried to catch up with the Jews in the midst of the Red Sea, which had been supernaturally parted to provide dry land for the Israelites’ hurrying feet. The Egyptian soldiers were not so blessed; they were swept away and drowned when the parted waters suddenly broke over them like a tidal wave.

The epic Exodus tale of faith and freedom is recounted in the Haggadah – the “Telling” – which is the Seder’s liturgy. The “telling” is based on the commandment, “And thou shalt tell thy son in that day, saying: It is because of that which the LORD did for me when I came forth out of Egypt” (Ex. 13:8). Each Seder guest is provided with a copy of the Haggadah. And every child old enough to understand participates in the reading and ritual.

When I arrived at my first Seder, I had of course heard the Exodus story, but had little understanding of Passover’s traditions. That dinner was held in the home of a scholarly and revered rabbi. He is, by all accounts, a fine teacher and a man exceptionally beloved by his family, friends and students. More than two dozen people were seated at what looked like an endlessly long table. Many of those around me were the rabbi’s sons and daughters, grandchildren and extended family. But there were others there as well. One was a single mother, a battered wife who had recently received help and guidance from our host, hostess and a nearby synagogue. Others were relatives from abroad. An Israeli woman of more than 90 years sat near me; tiny and bent with age, she was still radiant with the joys of the feast. A Christian couple from Jerusalem joined us. And I was there, too – a friend of friends.

The Torah includes admonitions that the Jewish people should be kind to strangers and sojourners in their midst. “Remember that you were slaves in Egypt,” God instructed them. “That is why I command you to do this.”

Perhaps that’s one reason I was made so welcome as a Christian visitor.

The rabbi wore a knee-length black coat and a black velvet kippah (yarmulke). His son, who had recently been ordained as a rabbi, was dressed in much the same attire. Every man in attendance wore a kippah. The women had focused their wardrobes on modesty and muted colors. There was a quiet dignity to the affair. And, for me at least, one of the most beautiful aspects of the meal – which lasted more than four hours – was the singing of the father and son who enlivened the liturgy with their resonant and perfectly harmonized voices.

It was easy to “disappear” into that room and be a silent spectator. The lengthy dinner reflected the hosts’ devotion to the Haggadah and thus to the biblical tale. In a sense, as the rabbi’s wife and daughters cooked the meal (the amount of work they had done was almost unimaginable), they brought to life, in the form of food, the oral and biblical tradition of the Israelites’ harried flight from their oppressors.

We tasted of the bitterness of Egypt in the form of bitter herbs; we recalled the suddenness of the departure from Egypt with the matzos (as the Jews fled, there was no time for bread made with yeast to rise). We ate a paste of apples and nuts that represented the mortar that had once set in place the bricks with which the Jews labored. We drank four cups of blessed, sweet wine. At the end, everyone sang together.

There was a sense of formality on that occasion, a careful adherence to custom and devotion and important details. It was a little like being in the midst of living biblical tableaux performed by the offspring of those who had actually experienced the story.

I attended another Seder a few years later, and it was as informal as the first was staid. The women were dressed colorfully, the men casually. Only one older gentleman wore a kippah. He had, however, neglected to bring his own, and asked to borrow one. As he self-consciously donned the ceremonial white satin cap, he explained quietly that he didn’t want to speak of Adonai – the Lord – without covering his head.

The food was served with no fanfare, and once each serving was eaten – along with slightly haphazard but sequential readings from the Haggadah – the plates were removed and more food appeared. There was a great deal of laughter and happy conversation between the readings, and a few restless young men went out to the balcony for a smoke. Yet, for all of the differences between them, the two Seders were in many ways alike, featuring the same symbolic foods.

In fact, at that informal table were some families who had come to Israel during the “Second Exodus” – refugees from Muslim lands who fled sometime between 1948 and 1970 due to persecution, abuse and expulsion. Doubtless they remembered well their own recent flight from harm (It is worth noting that today’s Christians are facing their own exodus from those same Middle East countries).

In the spontaneous spirit of the evening, instead of the precise and melodious singing of the two rabbis, the Haggadah was read aloud by the guests, one after another. Those who couldn’t read it in Hebrew – including me – read it in English. By the time we were finished, the old story had been told once again.

In attendance were some who are deeply involved in the functions of the present-day Jewish State. Their hearts and minds have long been tightly wound around discerning the best course for the young nation; their hope is to untangle its complex challenges. Some at the table even recalled the Day of Independence in 1948. I wondered: did they recognize the State of Israel as a promise fulfilled, or as an incomplete human dream, a work in progress?

As the Haggadah’s passages were read aloud, as at every Seder, the words recounted the unchanged story. They expressed the same hunger for a better life, the same need for divine intervention and human obedience, the same deliverance and the same hope for the future.

And, as always, everyone joyfully sang together at the end.

Rabbi David Hartman wrote, “Every year, Jews drink four cups of wine and then pour a fifth for Elijah. The cup is poured, but not yet drunk. Yet the cup of hope is poured every year. Passover is the night for reckless dreams; for visions about what a human being can be, what society can be, what people can be, what history may become. That is the significance of ‘Le-shanah ha-ba-a b’Yerushalayim‘ – Next year in Jerusalem.”

Next year in Jerusalem. For nearly 2,000 years, every Seder has ended with that prayerful promise. After the Jews were scattered among the nations following the destruction of Jerusalem and its Holy Temple in 70 AD, they endured homelessness, abuse, hunger, bloodshed and even slavery. But they never stopped praying.

During recent centuries, Jews have arrived in the land of their forefathers just as they did in the Bible story. In mass emigrations from other lands, leaving behind the ashes of destruction, they have entered Israel by the millions: one by one, family by family. Today they are home at last.

And at every Seder I’ve attended, in the heart of Jerusalem, we have renewed the Jews’ celebration of life.

For me, at least, it still feels like a miracle.

Portions of the preceding account of Passover celebrations is adapted from my book, Saturday People, Sunday People: Israel through the Eyes of a Christian Sojourner (Encounter Books).

Apr 23, 2015 | Christians and Minority Rights

In his Sunday sermon on April 12, “Pope Francis referred to the 1915 Turkish mass killings of Armenians as the ‘first genocide of the 20th century.’”

This papal declaration instantly flared into a diplomatic uproar. It absolutely infuriated Turkey’s Islamist President Tayyip Erdogan, who “warned” the Pope against repeating his “mistaken” statement.

There was actually no mistake about it: The fact is, the Armenian Genocide cost 1.5 million Armenian Christians their lives, along with another million Assyrian and Greek believers.

And, thanks to the Pope’s pronouncement and Erdogan’s outrage, the rest of the world was effectively reminded of the approaching centennial of that genocide, which will take place on April 24.

A death march to nowhere.

The horror story began on April 24, 1915, when Turkish authorities arrested hundreds of Armenian professors, lawyers, doctors, clergymen and other elites in Constantinople (now Istanbul). These revered members of the community were jailed, tortured and hastily massacred.

That mass murder marked the initiation of a death sentence on an entire religious population.

As reports of the leaderships’ slaughter spread across Turkey, terror gripped Armenian cities, towns and villages, which in 1915 were home to approximately 2,100,000 souls. According to the University of Minnesota’s Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, by 1922, only 387,800 Armenians remained alive.

After killing the most highly educated and influential men in the community, the Turks began house-to-house searches. Ostensibly they were looking for weapons, claiming that the Christians had armed themselves for a revolution.

Since most Turkish citizens owned rifles or handguns for self-defense in those days, it wasn’t difficult for the Turks to find arms in Armenian homes. And this served as sufficient pretext for the government to arrest enormous numbers of Armenian men who were subsequently beaten, tortured and, like the others, mass murdered.

The family members who survived – mostly women, children, the ill and the elderly – were forced to embark upon what has been described as a “concentration camp on foot.” They were told they would be relocated; in reality, they were sent on a death march to nowhere. They were herded like animals, – with whips and cudgels and at gunpoint.

Armenian Genocide
Armenians deported in Turkey.

These captives were provided with little or no food or water. Old people and babies were the first to die. Mothers were gripped with insanity, helplessly watching their little ones suffer and succumb; more than a few took their own lives. Eyewitness accounts and photographs remain today, and they are heart wrenching. Corpses littered the roads; nude women were crucified; dozens of bodies floated in rivers.

On Jan. 5, 2015, Raffi Khatchadourian published a personal essay in The New Yorker about his Armenian grandfather, who somehow survived the Armenian Genocide. He described the brutality:

Whenever one of them lagged behind, a gendarme would beat her with the butt of his rifle, throwing her on her face till she rose terrified and rejoined her companions. If one lagged from sickness, she was either abandoned, alone in the wilderness, without help or comfort, to be a prey to wild beasts, or a gendarme ended her life by a bullet.

Another portrait of those terrible times, The Forty Days of Musa Dagh, is a work of historical fiction written in the 1930s by Franz Werfel, an Austrian Jew. A meticulously researched account based on a true story, the novel relates the insubordination of a group of some 5,000 Armenian villagers who lived at the foot of a seaside mountain called Musa Dagh. Led by a courageous Armenian veteran of the Turkish army, the townsmen defied Turkish relocation orders. Instead, they fought for their lives and many of them survived; French ships eventually rescued them.

A portrait of defiance and courage, Forty Days of Musa Dagh inspired Jews in Polish ghettoes to fight to the death against their Nazi overlords. Unsurprisingly, Werfel’s book fed the flames of many a Third Reich book-burning.

Some Turks claim that World War II-era Armenian Christians had aligned themselves with Russia and were therefore a threat to Turkish security. But although the excuse that Armenian Christians were “enemies of the Turkish State” is still bandied about, German historian Michael Hesemann documented that they were killed for explicitly religious reasons:

In the end, Armenians weren’t killed because they were Armenian, but because they were Christians. Armenian women were even offered to be spared if they convert to Islam. They were then married into Turkish households or sold on slave markets or taken as sex slaves into brothels for Turkish soldiers, but at least they survived. A whole group of Islamized Crypto-Armenians was created by this offer to embrace Islam. But at least it shows that the Armenians were not killed because they were Armenians, but because they were Christians.

Indeed, the Armenian Genocide is described as a jihad in numerous accounts. Needless to say, that scenario is far from over. In fact the story of Christians being massacred by Islamist forces continues apace in the Middle East.

Not so long ago…

A little more than year ago, a nightmare scenario materialized in the Armenian town of Kessab, Syria. On March 21, Al-Qaeda affiliated terrorists attacked Kessab, driving the Christian residents out of their ancestral homes in an assault eerily reminiscent of the 1915 attacks.

In one article, which appeared on April 8, I quoted first-person statements from a few of Kessab’s residents:

“Before sunrise, we woke up to the horror of a shower of missiles and rockets falling on our town. Thousands of extremists crossed the borders towards our town. Missiles were fired from Turkey to destroy beautiful Kessab and to celebrate the approach of the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. Kassabtsi heroes defended the town with their simple hunting weapons…

“We had to flee only with our clothes. We couldn’t take anything, not even the most precious thing – a handful of soil from Kessab. We couldn’t take our memories…”

It was widely reported that the Turkish army assisted in this incursion or, at the very least, turned a blind eye to it. And certainly, as noted above, the residents of Kessab had not forgotten the genocide. In fact, they viscerally felt that their sudden expulsion and the ravaging of their homes and churches was a replay of the 1915 horrors, 99 years after the fact.

In Jerusalem’s Armenian Quarter, I attended the April 2014 remembrance of the genocide, which was followed by an impassioned demonstration in front of Jerusalem’s Turkish Consulate on behalf of Kessab. Dozens of protesters wearing “Save Kessab” T-shirts sang, chanted and demanded the rescue and repatriation of the town’s expelled population.

Armenian Genocide
Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day is observed around the world on April 24.

Of course the Middle East’s Christian persecution story didn’t end with Armenian Christians alone. And it continues with ISIS and other radical Muslim militias even now, as gruesome videos of beheadings and mass shootings continue to remind us.

I visited the Christian refugees in Erbil’s Christian enclave, Ankawa in November 2014. These mostly Assyrian Christians already knew about the Islamic State’s killing of Christians in Syria and Iraq. Then, suddenly, their own cities, towns and villages were given short notice – less than 24 hours, and sometimes just minutes – to get out or face death.

As I have written elsewhere,

The refugees lost their personal history, their identity. They were stripped of passports, birth and baptismal certificates, diplomas, national identification papers, commercial licenses and deeds of property. They handed over or left behind personal treasures like inherited jewelry, trophies, photographs and family memorabilia. The terrorists took their automobiles, cash, cellphones, computers, and business and personal files.

By the time they arrived in Erbil, collapsing in exhaustion in churchyards and on sidewalks, they had lost everything. They left their family homes with, as the saying goes, nothing but the shirts on their backs.

Their Christian faith was bruised and battered. In some cases, all hope was lost.

“Who speaks today of the annihilation…?”

It’s no wonder that Israelis ask me – some of them the offspring of Holocaust survivors – “Why aren’t you Christians doing anything about the persecuted Christians in the Middle East?”

They certainly have a point. Today’s fragmented global Christian community could learn valuable lessons from successful Jewish advocacy and activism. But the Jews’ insistence on paying attention to persecution – both their own and that of others – springs from a dark and haunted past.

In 1939, as he planned his “Final Solution” to rid the world of Jewry, Adolf Hitler notoriously said, “Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?”

Of course he was very wrong. Today, during the centennial of the Armenian Genocide, countless voices will speak out in remembrance of Turkey’s murdered Christian population.

Armenian Genocide
Dzidzernagapert, the Armenian genocide Memorial in Armenia.

As Hitler implied, and as Pope Francis indicated with the words “first genocide of the 20th Century,” the Armenian Genocide became a prototype for the Third Reich’s Holocaust.

Yet despite the Genocide and the Holocaust – and despite a sorry world’s declarations of “Never Again” – Jews and Christians continue to pay with their lives for anti-Semitism, anti-Christianity and Islamist fanaticism.

ISIS rapes, plunders, kidnaps, tortures and murders Christians by the thousands. Iran repeatedly threatens to annihilate Israel, while pursuing nuclear ambitions and supporting deadly terrorist attacks on Jews.

While such diabolical ideologies persist in driving the world mad, what can we do but stand together in defiant resistance?

Let’s resolve to speak the truth boldly.

Let’s pray effectually and fervently.

And let us take the time to recall, with reverence and resolve, 100 years of unspeakable losses.

May 25, 2015 | Christians and Minority Rights, Jerusalem Notebook, Muslims and Muslim Majority States

One of the pleasures of living in Jerusalem is the ever-changing kaleidoscope of intriguing people and historic places that surrounds me. Especially when I walk around Jerusalem’s Old City, I am conscious of a myriad of Christian clergy, garbed in a multitude of various robes and head coverings.

The Coptic monks who serve at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher are particularly easy to recognize because of their distinctive black hoods.

These koulla (Coptic) hoods are embroidered with 12 small crosses that represent Jesus’ 12 disciples, and one large one that signifies Jesus Christ. This symbolic array of crosses is meant to remind the monks that they, like Jesus and those who followed him during his earthly ministry, must leave everything temporal behind and look only to God.

Against the backdrop of today’s tumultuous Middle East, more and more members of the Coptic Christian community in Egypt and beyond – clergy and church members alike – are facing that very same choice.

Last Sunday, it was just such a koulla that caught my eye as I boarded a flight from Los Angeles to London. I spoke to the man wearing it: “You’re a Coptic clergyman, aren’t you?”

He smiled and nodded. “Yes, I’m the Coptic bishop of Los Angeles. My name is Bishop Serapion.” He went on to say that he was traveling to a Coptic Synod in Cairo, and for the next few minutes we talked about the plight of Copts and other Christians in the Middle East.

Later, while the plane taxied toward takeoff, I reflected on some of the recent catastrophes that have brought the Coptic community into the world’s focus.

Coptic Christians

Most notorious was the massacre of 21 Coptic Christian men on a Libyan beach, where the Islamic State’s executioners beheaded them in a choreographed bloodbath. Many of those faithful Christians – who refused to recant their faith – were murmuring or crying out the name of Jesus as the killers’ blades permanently silenced them.

This horrendous scene was broadcasted globally on YouTube, thanks to media-savvy ISIS’ ongoing campaign to terrorize the world while recruiting new warriors.

But infamous as it was, the massacre in Libya was far from the only attack on Coptic Christians in recent years. And ISIS has not been the only persecutor.

My colleague and friend Samuel Tadros is a senior fellow at Hudson Institute’s Center for Religious Freedom and the author of the critically acclaimed Motherland Lost: The Egyptian and Coptic Quest for Modernity.

On May 20, Tadros testified before the United States House of Representatives’ Subcommittee on the Middle East and North Africa on the subject “Egypt Two Years After Morsi.”

In his testimony, among other matters, Tadros described what happened in Egypt following the massacre of the 21 Coptic believers in Libya:

In … Al Our village, home to 13 of the Copts beheaded in Libya by ISIS, a mob attacked Coptic homes on the 27th of March in order to prevent a church from being built. The construction of that church had been ordered by President Sisi to honor the Coptic martyrs and as a symbol of a new Egypt where Copts were to be treated as equal citizens.

Instead, the church became a symbol of an Egypt in which Copts suffer from violence because of their faith and are treated as second-class citizens. The mob attack involved rocks and Molotov cocktails.

Rather than upholding the rule of law by arresting and prosecuting the attackers, the governor organized a reconciliation session between both communities. Unable to walk back the president’s promise, the local authorities forced Copts to accept that the proposed church be banished to the village outskirts. The authorities’ actions naturally encouraged the mob further and on the 29th of April, the house of one of the ISIS victims in Libya was attacked.

The Copts’ historic Christian community – founded in Alexandria during the first century CE by the Apostle Mark – comprises between 8 and 10 percent of Egypt’s 83 million citizens.

The Copts’ bloodlines are even more ancient than their Christian faith; they date back to the pharaohs, centuries before the Arab invasions in the seventh century CE. The Coptic language, still used in liturgy, is the closest existing language to that of ancient Egypt.

However, despite their historical heritage, as a religious minority in a Muslim-majority state, the Copts have lived for centuries under the dhimmi status spelled out in Islamic Sharia law. Simply put, that means that they are treated as inferior citizens. Meanwhile, in recent years, Copts have suffered escalating attacks, as Islamist extremists have specifically targeted them.

Christians in Egypt suffered exceptional abuse during the brief regime of Muslim Brotherhood President Mohamed Morsi. Then, in July 2013, in response to multiplied millions of Egyptians taking to the streets in protest against the Brotherhood, Egypt’s military removed Morsi from office.

This stunning turnaround offered some hope to Egyptians who were both wary and weary of the Brotherhood’s efforts to seize control of all branches of government. It also unleashed even greater violence upon the Copts.

On Aug. 27, 2013, I found a message in my inbox from Egypt’s Maspero Youth Union, an organization of young, outspoken Coptic Christians. It was a report about the widespread attacks on Coptic communities by the Muslim Brotherhood between Aug. 14 and 16:

38 churches completely destroyed, burned and looted
23 churches attacked and partially damaged
In addition, the following:

58 houses owned by Copts in different areas burned and looted
85 shops owned by Copts
16 pharmacies
3 hotels (Horus, Susana & Akhnaton)
75 cars, buses owned by churches
6 people killed based on their religious Christian identity
7 Coptic people kidnapped in Upper Egypt governorates
On Aug. 22, Kirsten Powers wrote in the Daily Beast,

The Muslim Brotherhood has been inciting violence against the Copts in an effort to scapegoat the religious minority for the ouster of former president Mohamed Morsi. The FJP Facebook page is filled with the rhetoric the Brotherhood leaders have been using in their speeches at the sit-ins: “The pope of the church is involved in the removal of the first elected Islamist president. The pope of the church alleges Islamic Sharia is backwards, stubborn, and reactionary.”

It’s true that Pope Tawadros and most Coptic Christians supported Morsi’s removal. But they were a fraction of the larger coalition against him.

Tadros told Powers, “These attacks are the worst violence against the Coptic Church since the 14th century.”

President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi was elected in a landslide vote a year ago, in May 2014. His election was welcomed by many Egyptians, and after his acceptance speech, Sisi was endorsed by several religious and political leaders, including Coptic Patriarch Tawadros II.

On Sunday, I asked Bishop Serapion if the Copts were faring better now, under Sisi’s presidency. Choosing his words carefully, he told me that there has been progress at the top levels of government, but that local authorities are still inclined to turn a blind eye to anti-Coptic persecution.

In his testimony, Tadros expanded on this theme:

President Sisi has undertaken some symbolic gestures towards Copts, such as visiting the Coptic Cathedral on Christmas Eve, and has developed a good relationship with Pope Tawadros II. Symbolic gestures need to be followed by meaningful steps. Despite repeated promises, the Egyptian regime has failed to pass a new law governing the building of houses of worship, which would streamline the process of building churches. Despite proclamations that all of Egypt’s citizens are equal, Copts continue to suffer from discrimination in government appointments.

Unofficial caps on Coptic representation in key state institutions such as the military and police force continue with several of them such as the intelligence service and the state security not having a single Copt within their ranks. President Sisi needs to change these discriminatory practices and develop a civil service based on merit and not one based on one’s faith.

In his speech to scholars of Al-Azhar, President Sisi underscored the need for religious reform. The fight against terrorism can no longer be limited to security means, but must be accompanied by a policy tool kit that addresses the root causes of radicalization and terrorism. He has stressed the need to change a religious discourse that has fueled hatred. While President Sisi’s call came as a welcome step, the Egyptian regime needs to prove its seriousness by beginning the process of reform.

For some Israelis, watching the abuses suffered by Coptic Christians stirs a feeling of déjà vu. According to historian Martin Gilbert, between 1948 and 1968, nearly 30,000 Jews fled Egypt in fear of their lives.

Rachel Lipkin and her family escaped Egypt in 1969 and she told me about their Coptic neighbors’ kindness and generosity during her father’s three-year imprisonment; they regularly brought eggs, milk and bread to her mother.

“I was just 11 years old at the time, but I clearly remember what they said,” she told me. “‘They are coming after you Jews,’ they told my mother, ‘and once they have driven you out of the country, then they will come after us Christians. We know this.’”

Indeed, Egypt’s Copts continue to brace themselves for the persecution that too frequently erupts against them, often without warning.

Leaders may come and go, but Islamists never stop targeting them.

“Like the Jews before them,” Tadros has written, “the Christians of the Middle East will be driven out of their homes, but, unlike the Jews, they will not have an Israel to escape to. The most fortunate will take the first planes to the U.S., Canada, and Australia, but a community of 8 million people cannot possibly emigrate en masse in a short time. The poorer Copts, the ones who face daily persecution, will be left behind.”

Following the example of their monks, who have taken a vow of poverty, Egypt’s beleaguered and defenseless Coptic Christian community is poised to leave everything earthly behind.

Their eyes are fixed on God – and for good reason.

Where else can they turn?

Jun 3, 2015 | Christians and Minority Rights, Muslims and Muslim Majority States | 0 comments

My peaceful life in Jerusalem was interrupted by a hectic sequence of airplanes, meetings, interviews and speaking engagements in the United States from early April until mid-May.

The focus of all this activity was twofold: My first concern was highlighting the ferocious Christian persecution in today’s world – particularly in the Middle East. Second was discussing the terrible devastation persecution inflicts upon millions of innocent victims and determining what to do about it.

Of course I enjoyed visits with family and friends, which made for some heartwarming reunions.

But another blessing also emerged. For a writer like me, there is a big difference between public appearances and working in virtual anonymity behind a computer. As uncomfortable as “visibility” may be, my journey provided me with a number of opportunities to hear from real people in real time – face-to-face. And that was invaluable.

Some of those I met were hard at work in congressional offices or researching on behalf of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. A few operated alongside Christian relief and development NGOs. Some were lawyers or lobbyists – or both.

Others were busy, well-informed Christian and Jewish professionals – concerned women and men I might otherwise never have heard from except for the occasional Facebook like or Twitter retweet.

Without question, there is something to be said for listening. And hearing their thoughts and ideas was indispensable.

Christian Persecution: Tragedy in Today’s World.

To begin with, here is an all-too-brief summary of the issues Middle East Christians are facing:

Globally, the persecution of Christians has been on the upswing since the 20th century. But it has increased exponentially in the Middle East since the upheaval that followed the Iraq War in 2003, and – far more dramatically – since the so-called Arab Spring erupted in 2010 alongside the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq in 2011.

Today, the Syrian civil war and the emergence of the Islamic State have not only caught indigenous Christians in the crossfire, they have made these Christians primary targets for Islamist terrorists. Untold thousands of believers have died or disappeared, and millions more are refugees on the fringes of various nations or displaced persons within their countries of origin.

This is happening right now a region that, for 2,000 years, have been known as “the cradle of Christianity.”

During my trip to the U.S., I listened to various perspectives about Christian persecution – sometimes alongside the similar abuse of Jews that often preceded it. And the typical response I heard went something like this:

“I really care. In fact I’m deeply troubled by what I’m hearing. But I have no idea what to do about it!”

Naturally there were other, less encouraging responses, too.

One of the most distressing for me – an American Christian – is the rejection of Christian refugees by the U.S. government. I attended several meetings with Faith McDonnell in Washington, DC; she has detailed some hard facts in a powerful article published May 14 by The Philos Project. Faith wrote:

Evidence suggests that within the [Obama] administration not only is there no passion for persecuted Christians under threat of genocide from the Islamic State, there is no room for them, period. In fact, despite ISIS’ targeting of Iraqi Christians specifically because they are Christians, and, as such, stand in the way of a pure, Islamic Caliphate in the Middle East (and beyond), the U.S. State Department has made it clear that “there is no way that Christians will be supported because of their religious affiliation.”

Please read Faith’s entire article here.

Those of us who have had the opportunity to speak with Christian refugees know all too well their depth of despair. They have lost everything, including their loved ones, their personal identity, their past achievements and all vestiges of their personal possessions – much like the millions of Jews who were displaced in the 20th century.

As the saying goes, “First the Saturday People, then the Sunday People…” But alas, there is no Israel for Christians. And the U.S., as it did with many Jewish refugees decades ago, is refusing to receive them.

“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Those beautiful words were meant to welcome émigrés seeking to enter America and gain freedom, by the light of Liberty’s glowing torch. Emma Lazarus’s poem is sometimes quoted to include undocumented “immigrants,” but it no longer seems to apply to persecuted Christians.

“Deep Despair Everywhere…”

Robert Nicholson, the executive director of The Philos Project, visited Christian refugees in Jordan just last week. He wrote,

I sat in a crowded living room and listened to Ban, a young mother of two whose husband was kidnapped by ISIS and never seen again. I met Bashar, a doctor from Mosul, who had to flee with his children in the middle of the night when the church bells rang, warning of ISIS’s imminent advance into their city. I visited a church-school in Marka where almost 200 young refugee children are doing their best to make a life for themselves amidst the chaos.

None of these people can work under Jordanian law. None of them can return to Iraq. All of them want to emigrate to the West but few are getting through. There was a deep sense of despair everywhere we went…

Some Middle Eastern religious leaders who represent uprooted Christians cling to the hope that their flocks will quickly be able to return to their homes; that ISIS and other terrorists will be driven out; that a safe haven for Christians will be be created with trustworthy security protection.

Although that is a wonderful vision for the future, considering the dubious results of today’s military operations in Iraq and Syria, a safe haven for Christians is unlikely to happen any time soon.

In fact, the refugees themselves are not optimistic about returning to their towns and villages. For one thing, some of them have run for their lives more than once in recent years. I spoke to several who fled Baghdad during the anti-Christian terrorism in the early 2000s, resettling in Iraq’s Nineveh Plain. Then, last summer, they had to flee again. They managed to reach Erbil, Kurdistan, where most of them are living in squalor and uncertainty.

Tragically, other Iraqi Christians who fled Baghdad during those same upheavals made their way to Syria, where there was, at the time, a measure of protection for Christians.

Whatever Iraqi believers still survive – unlike the 250,000-plus Syrians who have already died in the Assad regime’s civil war – the majority of them are either hiding or hanging on to life in miserable refugee camps somewhere along the borders of Lebanon, Jordan or Turkey.

That’s not to say nobody cares. Several Christian countries, including Armenia, Georgia and, most recently, Poland, have declared their willingness to accept a few thousand Christian refugees. But they are not financially prepared to transport them, or in some cases, even to house them. And it is unclear how to proceed.

This situation is exacerbated by complex international documentation (thanks to United Nations bureaucracy), which is stipulated to make immigration and resettlement legal.

Getting Past Hopelessness.

Like Nicholson, I also encountered despair among the refugees I met in Erbil, Kurdistan in fall 2014. I felt it myself; the problems facing them seem insurmountable.

And recently, as I spoke to gatherings during my visit to the United States, I was asked the same question every place I went: “Why aren’t American Christians doing more to help their brothers and sisters in the Middle East?”

The answer to that question is complicated by several issues.

With a population of around 323 million, 77 percent of Americans self-identify as Christians. That amounts to nearly 250 million people. If they were united, they would be a virtually insurmountable bloc of influence.

However, they are fragmented – sadly so – by denominationalism, theological disputes, political alliances, local church concerns and, unfortunately, disinterest.

What would it take to bring a reasonable number of them together? To galvanize them into activism?

For one thing, most U.S. media does not report Christian persecution frequently, if at all. Just being informed requires a certain amount of effort.

Occasionally, of course, stories break through: 21 Coptic Christian men recently appeared on YouTube, marched to their deaths with knives at their throats and a dying prayer to Jesus on their lips.

For those who foolishly wonder if Copts, Assyrians, Chaldeans and other Eastern believers are “real Christians,” what more can be said? May we all have the faith to demonstrate such courage to the end.

But what to do? The process of bringing together a massive Christian grassroots movement in the U.S. – launching sizeable public demonstrations, persistent Congressional lobbying, media bombardment, etc. – requires stellar leadership, well-honed organizational skills and generous funding.

It’s long been my observation that Jews are far better at this kind of organization and activism than Christians. Sadly, they’ve had plenty of experience dealing with persecution and how to respond to it. Perhaps we should seek their help.

In the meantime…

We can organize or seek out upcoming events in our local areas.

One such occasion is “Justice for Assyrians” on June 6 in Chicago, featuring speaker Juliana Taimoorazy, with an after-party hosted by The Philos Project.

We can keep ourselves as informed as possible.

We can support trustworthy organizations that reach out to the persecuted.

We can pass the word via email and social media.

We can form our own information networks including friends, schools, churches, synagogues or other organizations.

We can write op-eds or letters to the editor.

We can demand action from our government.

And, of course, last but not at all least, we can pray.

“…The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and wonderful results.” (James 5:16)

So let us pray. And may the “wonderful results” of our intercession and intervention – genuine hope, new beginnings and brighter tomorrows – soon be evident among far-flung, longsuffering sisters and brothers.

Jun 19, 2015 | Jerusalem Notebook, Jews and the Jewish State

Christians in Israel awakened on June 18 to distressing news. Overnight, angry vandals had attacked one of the loveliest settings in Israel, on the shore of the tranquil Sea of Galilee. In an act of hate-fueled destruction, they set the humble and historic Tabgha church aflame. The Times of Israel reported,

A fire broke out at the Church of the Multiplication at Tabgha, on the Sea of Galilee, early Thursday in what police suspect was an arson attack.

Firefighting crews successfully doused the blaze and two people who were in the building suffered minor smoke inhalation.

In an entrance corridor of the building … Hebrew graffiti was found, reading, “The false gods will be eliminated” – a quote from the Aleinu prayer.

The Tabgha church is beloved by Christians all around the world, remembered for its 5th century mosaic portraying a basket of bread and two fishes. Christians believe that Jesus performed the miracle in which he fed 5,000 of his followers at this very site, located alongside the rippling Galilee shoreline. Unwilling to send them away hungry after they had listened to his teaching for many hours, Jesus broke and divided a small portion of food – five loaves and two fishes – into enough sustenance to feed a multitude and more [Matthew 14:13-21].

Beatitudes

Today, the Roman Catholic Benedictine Order oversees the church and its adjoining grounds. According to their early reports, the church sanctuary itself was not significantly harmed. The roof, some storage areas and a few meeting places were the most badly damaged.

But deeper injury was inflicted on the tenuous alliance between Israel’s Jews and Christians. The bold red graffiti marking the incident indicated that the attack was the work of “price-tag” vandals; this term generally describes vandalism carried out against non-Jews in response to Arab attacks, government decisions or disapproval of Christian activity.

Capt. (res.) Shadi Halul is a tireless champion of positive Jewish-Christian relations. He founded the Christian IDF Officers Forum, serves as a reserve paratrooper and was interviewed by Army Radio about the attacks.

If in this case Jewish zealots are fingered, then, first of all, they clearly don’t represent all the Jews. They’re criminals who should be in prison and not walking around freely.

If they think this is how they can help themselves and strengthen their own beliefs then I just want to say it only damages their beliefs and damages their justice, and the justification for their being here in this land.

Just three days before the ugly Tabgha incident took place, two friends and I made our way north from Jerusalem to interview Halul in his Gush Halav home. He works tirelessly there on behalf of his people, his faith and the very issues highlighted in the arson attack: trust and unity between Christians and Jews in Israel.

Like Tabgha, Gush Halav is a tranquil and picturesque spot, set beneath brilliantly blue skies and among rolling hills in Northern Galilee. It is within sight of the Lebanon border and is one of many local villages with majority Christian populations and proud histories.

Halul belongs to the Maronite community, which is named after a 4th century monk, St. Maron. In May 2014, Lebanese Cardinal Bechara Rai – the Maronite patriarch – arrived during Pope Francis’ visit to Israel. His presence served as a reminder of the local Christians’ heritage.

Maronites are a Christian community that traces its roots to southern Lebanon. No more than 10,000 Maronites live in Israel, a tiny fraction of an already small Christian community.

A local Maronite bishop introduced Cardinal Rai to a crowd of several hundred, but he needed no introduction. He is, after all, the religious equivalent of a rock star.

The cardinal spoke at the entrance of an old stone church, one of the only remaining buildings from the Maronite village of Kfar Bar’am in northern Israel. During its 1948 war for independence, Israel asked residents to leave for two weeks – and never let them come back. Former residents and their descendants have been trying to return ever since. Cardinal Rai said he would ask the Vatican to encourage Israel to allow Kfar Bar’am to be rebuilt.

When he began his activism, Halul – who is himself eager to see Kfar Bar’am rebuilt – initially focused his efforts on encouraging young Christian Israelis to enlist in the Israeli Defense Forces.

It has become increasingly clear that Christians living in Israel experience safety and security to a degree that is incomparable in any of the surrounding countries. Violence against Christian minorities in Iraq, Egypt, Syria and other Muslim lands is rampant and deadly.

Halul and his colleagues believe that Israeli Christians can express their gratitude and loyalty to Israel by defending their homeland – just as the Druze and Bedouin participate in the Israeli military.

Halul has also successfully lobbied for the recognition of a separate identity for non-Arab Christians in Israel, who are part of a faith community that pre-dates Islam. In October 2014, he and his wife made history by changing their 2-year-old son’s registry in the Interior Ministry from Arab to “Christian Aramean.”

Both Maronite and Assyrian churches are categorized as Aramean and recite ancient liturgies in the Aramaic language – the lingua franca in the region during the 1st century, and therefore the language of Jesus.

Islam was introduced to the region in the 7th century, and although many Aramean Christians did not convert, most of them now speak Arabic.

Halul is well aware of currents of mistrust between Jews and Christians in Israel, in large part due to discomfort with each other’s language and culture, historical grudges and religious stigmas. He knows that the process of building a solid, lasting relationship between the two groups is not easy. However, as he showed me some of his research, I could see that he clearly has reason for his hope.

Out of a file bulging with old documents he brought forth an astonishing fragment of history, an exchange that took place between Jewish leaders and Maronite Christians in the 1930s and 1940s. Their rapprochement unfolded in the years before the State of Israel was founded.

He handed me a copy of a typewritten document from 1942, published by the Jewish Agency’s Zionist Archives, researched by Dr. Edmund Meir. This report contains a remarkable statement by the Maronite Patriarch, Anthony II Peter Arida, made in 1937:

The Jews are not only our ancestors, but also our brethren. We are of the same origin. We speak almost the same language. Our fathers are your fathers. We are proud to be sons of the same race. We owe everything to Judaism. Our doctrines are derived from your law. We sincerely desire that productive and enduring relations be established between us and the Jews in general, and the Zionists in particular. We want to help one another and we wish wholeheartedly that God may save the Jews from the persecutions which they are suffering in an unjust and inhuman way, both in Germany and in Palestine.

In the same report, another church leader – Archbishop Ignace Mobarat, Maronite archbishop of Beirut – is also quoted. He first spoke of the horrors imposed on the Jews by Adolph Hitler, who was also said to be persecuting the Catholic Church. He then – on behalf of Patriarch Arida – expressed hope that the expelled, fleeing and often rejected Jewish émigrés could settle in Lebanon:

We have tried to influence the authorities to permit the Jews to enter the Lebanon. The presence of the Jews in Palestine has made the Holy Land an object of envy in the whole world. Whereas the whole world moans in an economic crisis, there is no crisis in Palestine. People with petty minds feel jealous about that and respond with ingratitude, atrocities, expulsion. Therefore we, His Beatitude and myself, want to say to you: Be welcome, Jews. If I have said once that His Beatitude is the patriarch of the Jews, I now declare myself as the archbishop of the Jews.

Those stunning statement were made in 1937. Five years later – after the Third Reich’s full-blown assault on Jews was becoming evident to the world – Meir’s report for the Jewish Agency continued with his comments on the previous statements by the Lebanese Patriarch and Archbishop:

The Muslims of Syria and the Lebanon were not satisfied with these utterances. There are reports about an incident between the Patriarch and the Mufti of Beirut.

Since then, nothing seems to have transpired about relations between Jews and Maronites. There are some analogies in the national life of the two peoples which perhaps have attracted the attention of Maronite leaders. In this case, it may be possible that there is something more at the bottom of the friendly words which we have heard, and that in the future these two minorities will still have to say and to give something one to the other.

Standing on a windblown hillside near Shadi Halul’s home, looking across orchards and fields along the Lebanon border, I reflected on how true those words remain today – more than half a century later. Jews and Christian do, indeed “still have to say and to give something one to the other.”

As the radical Islamist saying goes, “First the Saturday people, then the Sunday people.” In the Muslim lands that cruelly expelled the Jews in the 20th century – often violently – today’s Christians are now suffering similar abuses. Together, as people devoted to the Word of God, Jews and Christians may not agree on all things, but surely we can stand together on our bloodstained common ground.

Like the loaves and fishes at the Galilee shore, perhaps small endeavors focused on strengthening understanding, trust and cooperation between Jews and Christians – heartfelt labors carried out by Capt. Halul and many others – will be divinely blessed, generously enlarged and miraculously multiplied.

Meanwhile, in our efforts, we can find inspiration in the memory of St. Maron. Maronite Christians eulogize him gratefully: “As you stood firm as a cedar, my shakiness is settled; as you outstretched your arms like great branches, I unwind my tension; as you felt the fresh breeze against you, I open my heart to the winds of God’s love.”

Jun 30, 2015 | Christians and Minority Rights, Jerusalem Notebook, Jewish-Christian Relations, Jews and the Jewish State

I have spoken with dozens of American Christian visitors to Israel during my nine years in Jerusalem, especially since the 2008 election of President Barack Obama. As the years have passed, their troubled thoughts and uneasy observations about the present American administration and its policies have steadily increased.

An enormous amount of written material has made its way from my inbox, past my eyes and into my trash folder. I have received blogs, articles, emails, jokes and more. Some are clever and articulate, some are misspelled and some are nearly incoherent. But every one of them communicates a sense of apprehension.

Many of these concerns relate to religious freedom and minority persecution, both in the United States and abroad. Others are economic, philosophical and ideological. Still others are concerned about America’s increasingly strained relationship with the Jewish State. Naturally, most correspondents are quick to say that the American people still “support Israel.”

But what about the American president?

A lot of Christians are aware of shifting global alliances; they share an eagerness to uncover possible fulfillments of biblical prophecy. Others wonder if the president is secretly Islamic. Still others – those from more international backgrounds – have taken me by surprise with the deep fears and dangers they intuit, in large part because of current American policies vis-à-vis Israel.

Since my earliest days in Jerusalem, I have been impressed with the work of one particular scholar, Michael Oren. I met him while he was part of an elite think tank at Shalem Center – the Adelson Institute for Strategic Studies – where he worked in the company of his good friend and fellow author Yossi Klein Halevi, as well as with today’s Minister of Defense Moshe Ya’alon, all under the direction of former Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky.

Before Oren served as an Israeli ambassador to the U.S. from 2009 – 2013, he was already well known in Israel as an historian and best-selling author. His book “Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East” is an authoritative record that also happens to be beautifully written. It’s not every day that a history book is also a page-turner.

The same could be said of another of Oren’s offerings, “Power, Faith and Fantasy: America in the Middle East 1776 to the Present.” Released in 2007, it was acclaimed by historians and critics alike.

This book introduced me to Oren.

One of the first things I learned about him was that Oren holds America’s Christians in high regard. In a conversation with him, he told me about the research he’d embarked upon while writing “Power, Faith and Fantasy” and how it had revealed America’s deep connections to the Jewish State and the greater Middle East – powerful bonds that were strongly rooted in Christian faith and biblical belief.

One of the book’s fascinating aspects is the link it discloses between the first decades of American history and Islam. Between 1801 and 1805, the newly formed U.S. Marine Corps waged fierce battles against the Barbary Pirates, merciless thugs who ruled the high seas along “the shores of Tripoli.”

These Muslims were in the business of ravaging ships, kidnapping fair-skinned western women to be sold (at premium prices) as slaves or to various harems, and abducting naval officers who were held for huge amounts of ransom (some of the men were given the choice of conversion to Islam or death).

It turns out that America’s earliest military involvement in the Middle East was aggressive, ferocious and successful.

Oren reported that in the meantime, as early as 1819, the first Protestant missionaries left Boston for the Middle East “with the goal of restoring Palestine to Jewish sovereignty” along with saving souls.

The Christian dream of “restoration” – re-establishing exiled Jews in their Promised Land – was a powerful influence.

En route to the New World, the Puritans took the concept with them to Holland, where they petitioned the Dutch government to ‘transport Izraell’s sons and daughters … to the Land promised their forefathers … for an everlasting Inheritance.’

Harvard College President Increase Mather went so far as to call ‘…for the destruction of the Ottoman Empire to make way for the Jews’ return.’

Oren told me that this early American heritage was both moving and motivating to him. It inspired him to seek solid footing with today’s American Christian community.

Even more such insights emerge from the pages of Michael Oren’s newly released book “Ally: My Journey Across the American-Israeli Divide,” which was launched just over a week ago. There he also speaks of the American founders’ generation, which “felt a powerful responsibility for restoring the Old Israel to the original Promised Land. ‘I really wish the Jews in Judea an independent nation,’ John Adams, America’s second president professed.”

Oren went on to say,

Discovery of this “restorationist” strand in mainstream American thinking came as a shock to me, and a deep source of gratification. I felt as if Adams was validating a belief that quietly guided my life. Beyond their common strategic interests, Israel and the United States were spiritually and morally bound.

Historical American Christians and their views about Israel are certainly intriguing. However, that topic is a far cry from the primary focus of Michael Oren’s electrifying new book.

For Christians who continue to wrestle with troublesome questions about Obama, his foreign policy and his treatment of the Jewish State, Oren’s book “Ally” is essential reading.

Even before it appeared on bookstore shelves or flickered to life on Kindle screens, “Ally’s” early buzz had already stirred up a political and diplomatic firestorm. The book provides a surprisingly personal inside look at Oren’s four-year tenure as Israel’s ambassador to the United States. Fortunately for his readers, Oren – who clearly took careful notes from beginning to end of his tenure – is eloquent, candid and thorough.

“Ally” has received glowing reviews. John Podhoretz, the editor of Commentary Magazine, wrote in The New York Post, “Michael Oren is going to be the talk of Washington and Jerusalem. I’m not sure that in the annals of diplomatic history there’s ever been anything quite like this astonishing account of Oren’s four years as Israel’s ambassador in Washington. It’s an ultimate insider’s story told while all the players save Oren are still in place.”

In the Jerusalem Post, Herb Keinon explained, “‘Ally: My Journey Across the American-Israel Divide,’ is a first-hand account of ‘mistrust, mistakes and missed opportunities’ that Oren saw as ambassador from 2009 to 2013, with ‘Obama in the role of bully in chief.’ In the book he reportedly describes how Israel was continuously blamed for lack of progress on the diplomatic front, while the Palestinians were given a free pass.”

Other interested parties – particularly those who represent Obama’s political orientation or administration – are less than pleased with Oren’s outspoken and revealing account of his Washington years. He has faced criticism for everything from dishonesty to disingenuous book promotion to dabbling in psychobabble.

“Michael Oren published an imaginary account of what happened,” U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro said. “I disagree with what he wrote. He was an ambassador in the past, but he is now a politician and an author who wants to sell books.”

Yair Lapid, former finance minister and leader of the Yesh Atid party, told Israel radio that Oren’s claim of Muslim influence on the U.S. president was “utter nonsense” and “pseudo-psychological analysis not based on anything.”

Interestingly, a majority of such critiques – and there are a number of them – do not dispute specific facts or personal accounts in “Ally.” As the saying goes, they simply attack the messenger because they are displeased with the message.

After I read Oren’s book, I spoke with him and thanked him for addressing so many of the concerns I’ve heard expressed by Christian friends, both in Jerusalem and in the United States: worries about Obama’s political philosophy, his warm embrace of Islam and his hard-nosed attitude toward Israel and, specifically, Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu.

Oren’s new book addresses many of our doubts and goes a long way in explaining what’s been happening behind the scenes since 2009.

But as far as our spiritual questions are concerned – precise answers about the deepest intentions of our leaders, the fate of their misbegotten plans, and the outcome of the tumultuous times in which we’re living– those answers are yet to be revealed.

Still, other realities are undeniable. We can cherish the powerful words of the Bible’s poets and prophets and kings. We can rely on the ancient wisdom they contain. And we can trust the One who inspired them – whose promises remain true yesterday, today and forever:

Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter…

Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him;
Do not fret because of him who prospers in his way,
Because of the man who carries out wicked schemes.
Cease from anger and forsake wrath;
Do not fret; it leads only to evildoing.
For evildoers will be cut off,
But those who wait for the Lord, they will inherit the land.

[Isaiah 5:20; Psalm 37:7-9 NASB]

Jul 21, 2015 | Christians and Minority Rights

An unusual and touching human-interest story broke in The Times of Israel on July 16, recounting the remarkable efforts of a Holocaust survivor who has pledged himself to rescue 2,000 Christian refugees from Iraq and Syria and to relocate them in Poland.

Lord George Weidenfeld, the Christian refugees’ benefactor, is a 95-year-old British publisher and peer of the realm. But he is far more than just a successful businessman.

In 1938, this wealthy co-founder of Weidenfeld and Nicolson Publishing House and Member of the House of Lords was a desperate and penniless Jew. Weidenfeld was rescued from Nazi-occupied Austria and transported to Britain by Christians – Quakers and Plymouth Brethren.

The Independent reported, “The publisher is spearheading Weidenfeld Safe Havens Fund, which last week supported the flight of 150 Syrian Christians to Poland on a privately chartered plane to allow them to seek refuge, making them the first beneficiaries of the resettlement project.”

Weidenfeld explained that he owes a debt of gratitude to the Christian community for his own rescue. After recently facilitating the transport of the first 43 Syrian families to Poland, he has vowed to continue to assist them for 12 – 18 months – long enough for them begin new lives out of harm’s way. He also intends to arrange for hundreds more Christians to immigrate in the months to come.

About his efforts, Weidenfeld said,

In the 1930s, thousands of Jews – mainly women and children – were helped by Christians who took enormous personal risks to save them from certain death. We owe a debt of gratitude. We have been deeply moved by the plight of Christians in conflict-torn Middle East countries, and we are supporting the transfer of Christian families to safe havens where they can lead normal lives.

This heartwarming effort is noteworthy for a number of reasons, and it has not gone unnoticed. Apart from its lessons of gratitude and generosity, it also exposes a sea change in the thinking of an increasing number of relief organizations concerned with the plight of millions of refugees and displaced persons in the Middle East.

Victims of war and invasion who have fled the sword of ISIS terrorists, the barrel bombs of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s army or the deadly scourge of various Islamist mobs can be counted in the multiplied millions.

These displaced people – hundreds of thousands of whom are victims of Christian persecution – clearly need a safe haven and a new beginning. But where? Who will provide help for them? And how long must they wait?

When I visited Kurdistan in October 2014, my conversations with both Christian and Muslim refugees were distressing. Grim and weary, and with little hope reflected in their eyes, they spoke about the inestimable losses they had sustained.

They described not only the brutal deaths of family members and friends, but also spoke about the stripping away of their possessions – their homes, businesses, clothes and household goods, personal identity papers, deeds, cash, and computers, vehicles and even cellphones and medications. They had been driven out of their houses with nothing more than the proverbial shirts on their back.

As they explained what had befallen them, they seemed skeptical about returning to their homes. Their longtime neighbors had betrayed them, and it was well known that Sunni Muslims in their towns and villages had aligned themselves with the Islamic State, making a pact with murderers, rapists and kidnappers rather than defending their communities.

Still, at that time, church leaders in the Kurdistan area cherished the hope that Kurdish Peshmerga fighting forces, along with Shia militias and U.S.-sponsored bombing raids, would soon drive ISIS out of the many towns and villages they had invaded.

These hopeful clergymen envisioned well-trained defense units – comprised of local Christians as well as seasoned international warriors – that would guarantee protection for the Nineveh Plain and thus create a refuge for Christians within their own ancient homelands.

Although some expressed doubt about this scheme, few wanted to argue with beleaguered religious leaders. If these clergymen opted to entrust their people to the protection of the Kurds until peace was restored, so be it. Meanwhile, donated food, clothing, hygienic kits and weatherization materials continued to be brought in.

But over the course of the next six or eight months, support for the idea of a Christian refuge began to erode. As days turned to weeks, car bombs rocked Erbil, Kurdistan’s capital, and the security situation became increasingly unpredictable. Before long, the conversation changed.

As I wrote in the Washington Times,

Some religious leaders … believe that ISIS and other terrorists will soon be driven out and that a safe haven for Christians will be created, including trustworthy international security protection. However … there are many who question this optimistic scenario. Indeed, most experts say that a safe haven for Christians is unlikely to appear any time soon.

With this in mind, humanitarian organizations, human rights experts, Christian support agencies and donors have begun to look at the alternate plan that Weidenfeld recently adopted: airlifting refugees to safety outside the Middle East.

Moving vulnerable victims out of harm’s way – beyond the ebb and flow of warfare that has virtually washed away all semblance of “normal life” in Iraq, Syria and the surrounding countries – can offer a far more urgent solution.

Unfortunately, it is also complicated and challenging.

The Kurdistan Regional Government has proved itself capable of providing protection for groups of refugees, and a secure airport is available in Erbil. At the present time, airlifts from there are costly, but not a particularly high-risk endeavor.

But airlifts from inside Syria are another story. Refugees have to be transported through dangerous territory and disputed borders. Myriad potential dangers require strategic and tactical preparations and personnel.

Lebanon, Turkey and Jordan have now now closed their borders to departing Syrians; the resulting process of vetting self-proclaimed “refugees” to ensure they’re not terrorists is exhaustive. Because these countries are responsible for the evacuees’ resettlement for a year’s time, they are understandably cautious.

Meanwhile – to complicate matters further – very few countries on the receiving end are willing to open their doors to displaced Christians.

My friend and colleague Charmaine Hedding is the founder and director of the Shai Fund, a nonprofit relief organization based in Munich, Germany. In April, she and I sat through one discouraging meeting after another in Washington, D.C. Congressional aides, representatives from relief organizations, and religious freedom advocates all told the same story: There is little to no interest within the present U.S. government for welcoming Middle Eastern Christian refugees.

Why? Because specifying Christians for refugee status – although Christians make up only a small percentage of the millions of Middle Eastern refugees – is considered discriminatory against Muslims.

At the same time, few influential global voices are demanding change in immigration quotas or relaxation of entry requirements. Special consideration of persecuted Christians who need a new beginning, removed from warzones and threats of danger, is a top priority for concerned activists. Yet only a few international leaders have spoken up.

Where, for example, is the voice of Pope Francis?

As Catholic priest Benedict Kiely recently wrote in National Review,

Francis enjoys uncritical acclamation from media worldwide. He should turn that into an opportunity to call on the nations of the world – before it is too late – to open their borders generously to receive the thousands of Christian refugees who wish to leave Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Jordan.

So far, only a handful of countries – including Armenia, Canada, Poland and Belgium – have agreed to receive displaced Christians. Others have been approached without response.

I asked my Hudson Institute colleague Nina Shea, who directs the Center for Religious Freedom, how she and others make the case for providing visas to Christian refugees as a specific persecuted minority. She said there are three reasons to do so:

First of all, like the Jews in Nazi Germany, Middle East Christians are not simply victims of the war; they are targeted for religious cleansing by ISIS and other extremists. Second, they have no armies and militias of their own to protect them. And, finally, there is no Christian country or enclave left in the region where they can resettle, and meanwhile their own property is being distributed to others, not only by ISIS but, in Baghdad, by their own government.

Complaints that Christian visas discriminate against Muslim refugees were also voiced about Weidenfeld’s recent rescue of Syrian Christians to Poland. He robustly defended his project’s narrow focus. “I can’t save the world, but there is a very specific possibility on the Christian side. Let others do what they like for the Muslims.”

Weidenfeld hopes to replicate the work done by the late Sir Nicholas Winton, who died on July 1. Winton helped to organize “Kinderstransport” trains that saved more than 10,000 Jewish children from the Nazis.

“It was Quakers and other Christian denominations who brought those children to England,” Weidenfeld said. “It was a very high-minded operation and we Jews should be thankful and do something for the endangered Christians.”

Aug 4, 2015 | Christians and Minority Rights, Jerusalem Notebook

Has America’s present administration turned a blind eye to the Christian massacres in the Middle East?

Stories about this disappointing possibility have been circulating for months, but they at first seemed more like social media rumors than legitimate concerns.

Most people assumed that the United States would speak up, take positive action and prove itself – as it has historically – to be a safe haven for “your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”

Then came a devastating report from the National Catholic Register, which recounted the Obama Administration’s indifference to what Pope Francis has described as a “third world war, waged piecemeal … a form of genocide.”

According to the Register, the Iraqi Christian Relief Council has compiled figures on the status of Iraqi Christians. Out of the 25,014 refugees from Iraq who were admitted to the U.S. between January 2014 and June 2015, only 21 percent were Christian. More than 79 percent were Muslim. Never mind that during the 2014 Islamic State invasion of Iraq’s “Christian heartland,” virtually 100 percent of the survivors who fled to Kurdistan were Christians.

The ICRC also pointed out that during the same time frame, fewer than 1,000 Syrian refugees were admitted to the U.S. And only 4 percent of those were Christian.

Meanwhile, America’s dubious hospitality has been outpaced by less prosperous and spacious states like Poland, Armenia and Belgium, who have opened their arms to Christians. Canada is also presently receiving Christian refugees, while proposals are under consideration elsewhere.

I asked my colleague Nina Shea why the United States should reconsider its denial of Christian refugees.

“First of all,” she said, “like the Jews in Nazi Germany, Middle East Christians are not simply victims of the war. They are targeted for religious cleansing by ISIS and other extremists.

“Second, they have no armies and militias of their own to protect them.

“And, finally, there is no Christian country or enclave left in the region where they can resettle, and meanwhile their own property is being distributed to others, not only by ISIS, but in Baghdad, by their own government.”

Shea’s reference to the Nazis raises an important point: This isn’t the first time the U.S. has rejected refugees during a period of grave danger.

Indeed, when I discussed this tragic situation with some my Jerusalem friends, it was evident that today’s pattern of discrimination and rejection provokes bitter memories for the Jewish community.

During the 1930s and early 1940s, European Jews became progressively aware of the dangers they faced under Hitler’s Third Reich. Violence increased and their situation grew more precarious. Many decided to flee. But instead of providing the Jews with a warm welcome, America instead closed its doors to Jewish immigration.

The U.S. Memorial Holocaust Museum described the controversial rejection of immigrants from Nazi Germany.

Influenced by the economic hardships of the Depression, which exacerbated popular anti-Semitism, isolationism and xenophobia, the refugee policy of the U.S. State Department … made it difficult for refugees to obtain entry visas, despite the ongoing persecution of Jews in Germany.

Beginning in 1940, the United States further restricted immigration by ordering U.S. consuls to delay visa approvals on national security grounds. After the United States entered the World War II in December 1941, the trickle of immigration virtually dried up, just as the Nazi regime began systematically to murder the Jews of Europe.

As I reflect on America’s dismal rejection of Jews and now Christians, I think about the radical Islamist adage, “First the Saturday people, then the Sunday people.”

Or, as a photo of a Palestinian flag in my book “Saturday People, Sunday People” says in Arabic, “On Saturday we kill the Jews, on Sunday we kill the Christians.”

Of course the Holocaust took place at the hand of Adolf Hitler and his Jew-loathing Nazi henchmen. Yet there was, and still remains, a powerful connection between yesterday’s Third Reich and today’s radical Islamism.

In 1921, a cold-blooded, anti-Semitic Arab named Amin “Hajj” al-Husseini was promoted by British Mandate authorities to a lofty and influential religious position: the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem.

Husseini was ambitious and power-hungry. He was also an ideological ally of the Nazis and aggressively collaborated with them.

Husseini met with the Fuhrer at least once, and repeatedly conspired with several of his closest Nazi associates, including Heinrich Himmler. Husseini applauded the “Final Solution of the Jewish problem” and vowed to recreate it in the Middle East.

Several sources date the “Saturday people, Sunday people” slogan to anti-Zionism riots in the 1920s, with Husseini’s serving as key ringleader. With increasing ardor, he sought to drive the Jews out of Palestine or, better yet, kill them.

Husseini was enormously successful. His strategic use of blood libels, baseless rumors and rabble-rousing tactics increasingly inflamed the Arabs’ disdain for the Jews.

In my book “Saturday People, Sunday People,” I describe one of Husseini’s best-known early successes.

In mid-August 1929, following a Jewish demonstration near the Temple Mount, which involved flags and patriotic songs including Hatikvah, Arabs were incited by false reports of Jewish attacks on the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. The incitement has long been attributed to the infamous anti-Semitic Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj al-Husseini, who later collaborated with Hitler in plans to exterminate the Jews in the Middle East.

The violence stirred up by those false rumors led to the first modern “pogrom” in Israel, during which 67 Jewish residents of Hebron were murdered.

In the years that followed the Hebron massacre, Husseini and his devotees accelerated their efforts. Anti-Semitic/anti-Zionist hostility simmered, swelled and threatened to erupt across the Middle East.

Forced labor camps for Jews – imposing brutal conditions – were constructed in Morocco and Algeria. Plans to fully cleanse the Middle East of Jews were laid once Hitler’s erstwhile favorite general, Erwin Rommel, successfully completed his invasion of North Africa.

The first large-scale eruption took place in Iraq in 1941 with a massacre of Jews known as the Farhud; some described this event as a “Nazi-like pogrom.” During its 48-hour bloodletting, more than 180 Jews lost their lives and some 1,000 were injured.

Survivors of the Farhud reported that – several days before the event – many Jews’ homes were marked with a red handprint, the “Hamsa.” This eerily foreshadowed the marking of Christian houses in Mosul in 2014 with the letter “N” for Nasrani (Christians).

The Farhud was the beginning of surging violence against Jews across the Middle East, which climaxed in 1948, following the declared independence of the State of Israel.

Between 1948 and the early 1970s, some 850,000 to 1,000,000 Jews were driven out of their Muslim-majority homelands.

Like today’s Christians, those Jews were marked for death or expulsion by the crazed hatred of Muslim extremists. But unlike today’s Christians, who have been turned away by most of the world’s nations, Middle Eastern Jews had a place to go – a homeland. They managed to make their way to the newborn State of Israel.

It was a painful struggle for the fledgling nation to provide shelter and food for hundreds of thousands of penniless, Arabic-speaking refugees. And it was an indescribable agony for the displaced and dispossessed – many of who had been prosperous, well-known and eminently successful just months before.

Still, they had reached the safe haven foretold by the vision of Zionism – “to be free people in our land, the land of Zion and Jerusalem.” And they had also seen their ancient prophets’ words fulfilled: Jews, once scattered to the four corners of the earth, were being re-gathered in the Promised Land.

The Saturday people had finally come home.

Which brings us to today. What lies ahead for the Sunday people?

A heartwarming story recently emerged about Lord George Weidenfeld, a 95-year-old British publisher and peer of the realm who successfully airlifted 150 Syrian Christian men, women and children to Poland, with a goal of rescuing at least 2,000 of them.

It turns out that Christians had rescued the young, Jewish Weidenfeld from the Nazis many years ago. Mennonite and Quaker groups committed to saving Jewish children smuggled Weidenfeld out of harm’s way into the relative safety of Great Britain.

Today, Weidenfeld is assisting Christians, hoping to repay what he describes as his personal “debt of gratitude” to them.

In fact, Weidenfeld may also be pioneering the next phase in today’s ongoing efforts to rescue displaced Christians. Relief and development groups and their donors are considering the option of flying Iraqi and Syrian families to safety.

Airlifts may be to be the wave of the future. On the other hand, as the saying goes, there’s nothing new under the sun.

An airlift of near-biblical proportions took place during the late 1940s. It serves as a worthy reminder of what can be accomplished – despite ongoing Islamist terrorism, despite the rejection of the nations and despite the despair of the refugees and those trying to help them.

When heaven’s work is being done, nothing on earth is impossible.

Between 1948 and 1950 – unlikely as it seems – Alaska Airlines took part in the historic and daring rescue operation of some endangered Jews. Along with charter carriers and with military help, the small U.S. airline helped transport more than 40,000 Yemenite Jews to Israel.

Alaska Airlines’ website described the company’s courageous participation in “Operation Magic Carpet.”

Known as the lost tribe of Israel, the Yemenite Jews had wandered the deserts for at least two centuries after being driven out of Palestine. Nomads, they had never seen an airplane and never lived anywhere but a tent.

Ironically, their faith included a prophecy that they would be returned to their Holy Land on the wings of eagles.

An Alaska flight attendant, Miriam Metzger, who served as a nurse on several of those rescue flights, described a touching moment.

“One of the things that really got to me was when we were unloading a plane at Tel Aviv,” Marian explained. “A little old lady came up to me and took the hem of my jacket and kissed it. She was giving me a blessing for getting them home.

“In her eyes, we were the wings of eagles!”

With that in mind, let’s not grow weary in our efforts to reach out to today’s refugees, nor lose heart when our political leaders disappoint us.

Miracles still happen, and a promise is still a promise.

They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint [Isaiah 40:31]

Aug 24, 2015 | Jerusalem Notebook, Jews and the Jewish State

This year, summer arrived in Jerusalem on literal waves of heat. Fortunately – unlike in most of the sweltering Middle East – afternoon breezes cooled the air considerably. So one evening, I bravely stepped away from my apartment’s air conditioner and took a 15-minute walk to the Mamilla Mall.

Once I got there, I was reminded that despite the warm temperatures, the tourist season brings with it a bustling scene, as colorful crowds wend their way along Mamilla’s lively pedestrian shopping street, ascending and descending a flight of stairs to the Old City’s Jaffa Gate.

In addition to the mall’s very appealing collection of stores and boutiques, one of Mamilla’s attractions – at least for me – is the exceptionally varied array of shoppers. Unlike any other places I have ever visited, in Israel, even the most casual observer can make a fairly accurate guess about what people believe in, based on what they wear.

The shopping throngs at Mamilla comprise a casually defined religious mixture, with Muslim women in hijabs’ shopping shoulder-to-shoulder with Orthodox Jewish mothers, fathers and children. At the same time, clergy in clerical frocks representing the most venerable church traditions mingle with American Christian youth groups wearing matching T-shirts.

This kaleidoscopic scene always reminds me of the absurd accusation that Israel is an “apartheid state,” a label that was first popularized in Jimmy Carter’s infamous book “Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid.” Carter’s accusation was particularly ridiculous to the South Africans who actually experienced apartheid.

Even the notorious South African judge Richard Goldstone, who trashed Israel’s 2009 Operation Cast Lead in Gaza in a United Nations report, later decried the “apartheid” accusation in a New York Times op-ed.

“In Israel, there is no apartheid,” he wrote. “Nothing there comes close. Israeli Arabs – 20 percent of Israel’s population – vote, have political parties and representatives in the Knesset and occupy positions of acclaim, including in its supreme court. Arab patients lie alongside Jewish patients in Israeli hospitals, receiving identical treatment.”

Goldstone was correct (at least about that). Israeli Arabs are judges, army officers, lawyers and business people. Even diplomats.

Israel

Take, for example, George Deek, Israel’s vice-ambassador to Norway. An outspoken critic of what he describes as a “culture of victimhood,” he claims that this philosophy robs Israeli Arabs of their dignity. Of his upbringing, he has said, “I was a Christian Orthodox kid in a French Catholic school with a majority of Muslim students, in the Jewish country in the Arab Middle East. And nothing seemed more normal.”

Deek also pointed out that, while Arabs in Israel experience one of the “best qualities of life for Arabs in the region,” these people are surrounded by the ever-growing persecution of Christians in the Middle East.

“Outside Israel, Easter celebrations have become a rare sight. Christians were driven out of Mosul in Iraq. [They were] put to flight in Syria. The last church in Afghanistan was destroyed in 2010. Thirty Christians were beheaded in Libya. And in Gaza, bishops are beaten up and Christian symbols are forbidden.”

Deek could not be more correct. In the Middle East, persecution against the region’s ancient churches continues to smolder, flare and rage out of control. Inflamed by Islamist ideology and targeting minorities (particularly Christians), the brutal acts – including torture, beheadings, enslavement and other atrocities – have escalated to unprecedented levels.

The cradle of Christianity is all but going up in flames – most notably in Iraq and Syria, but also in Egypt and elsewhere in the region. Israel is the only country in the Middle East in which the Christian population is growing.

It is no wonder that some Arabic-speaking Christians in Israel have noted that they live in the region’s sole safe haven for their faith. And they have decided to do more than give thanks.

An increasing number of Greek Orthodox, Maronite, Assyrian and other Christian communities want to defend their homeland – and many of them have chosen to take action. Not only are they choosing to enlist in the Israeli Defense Forces, but they are also forming political parties and seeking reforms in Israel’s educational system, insisting that the country’s officially sanctioned curriculum includes Christian history alongside that of Judaism and Islam.

A young Arab-speaking Christian man put it this way: “I will continue to defend and protect the State of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state. I have no other country.”

As Goldstone pointed out, Arab-Israelis – both Christian and Muslim – serve essential roles in the country’s leadership.

For instance, Judge George Karra, an Arab from Jaffa, presided over the judicial panel that sentenced former Israeli President Moshe Katsav to a seven-year prison term for rape. Meanwhile, another leading Israeli jurist, Salim Joubran from Haifa, is the first Arab judge to receive a permanent appointment to the Israeli Supreme Court.

None of this should imply that the relationship between Arab and Jewish Israelis is trouble-free. It is not. There are debates, declarations and discussions, public and private, which include everything from infinitesimal woes to hugely significant issues affecting both populations. These involve matters like income and educational equality, construction permits, trash collection, bureaucratic impartiality and innumerable other issues involving alleged discrimination.

Nonetheless, Newsweek magazine claimed that “the real Arab Spring is blooming in Israel.”

Arab activists are using the Jewish State’s robust democracy and independent institutions to push their agenda of radical, but peaceful, political change. A rainbow coalition of nationalists, Islamists, feminists, socialists and supporters of Jewish-Arab co-operation stood in [the recent] election. The Joint List won 13 seats in the Knesset, the Israeli parliament, making it the third largest party.

Recently, a surprising and unexpected defense of Israel’s melting pot came from a young man who just graduated from Tel Aviv University and was awarded the role of valedictorian for his class.

Haisam Hassanein grew up in Egypt, in a rural area that was a hot-bed of anti-Semitism and fear of Israel.

“If you think you heard a million reasons why not to come to Israel,” he told the university’s appreciative graduation audience, “I heard a million and a half. Growing up in Egypt, the entire country had opinions about Israel, and none of them were positive. All we knew was that we had fought bloody wars, and that they were not like us.”

He went on to describe his first impressions:

On my very first day here at the university, I saw men in kippas [and] women in head scarfs and hijabs. I saw soldiers walking peacefully among crowds of lively students. I learned there were people of every kind in the university, and the university had a place for all of them: Jews, Muslims, Christians, Druze, Bedouins and even international students.

How fascinating is it to be in a city where you can to go a beach in central Tel Aviv and see a Muslim woman, a couple of gays kissing, and a Hasid sharing the same small space? Where else can you find a Christian Arab whose apartment is decorated with posters of Mao and Lenin? Where else can you see a Bedouin IDF soldier reading the Quran on the train during Ramadan? Where else can you see Ashkenazi and Mizrahi Jews arguing about whether or not Ashkenazi families had kidnapped Yemenite babies in the 1950s?

In a video that has been widely viewed, Hassanein related other insights that he had gleaned from his experience in Israel. “Perhaps the greatest revelation of my being here was that in spite of all the conflicting histories and identities, people are still able to live their daily lives in a spirit of cooperation,” he said. “We must always question our assumptions. Being here in Israel has taught me that life is full of paradoxes and complexities – that nothing is straightforward, and that things are often not as they are made to seem.”

Israel

As for me, I have lived in Jerusalem for more than nine years. And my own view of life in Israel largely mirrors Hassanein’s. There are complexities that mock simple explanations or pat answers. As the overused saying goes, “It’s complicated.” There are puzzles without solutions. There are disagreements that defy negotiation. Mistrust surges beneath the surface – more deeply than anger, resentment or hatred.

But above all else, the ebullient and brilliant Israelis are the beating pulse of the country. Like people everywhere, they have their problems, and they struggle and worry and fret.

But they are exceptionally courageous – insolent in the face of danger, and mockers of death. As a people they are optimistic, quick to laugh, sing and applaud. And when life goes wrong, they weep their tears, sweep up the remains of the day, and go out to face tomorrow.

I believe this, in large part, is because the people of Israel – despite all that threatens them – embody an ancient commandment:

“I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live.”

That’s exactly what the Israelis have done.

And, in fact, they do more than choose life. They celebrate it!

Sep 2, 2015 | Jerusalem Notebook, Jews and the Jewish State

Once or twice a year, I say goodbye to Jerusalem for a few weeks and return to the United States. And I often find myself in my former hometown: Orange County, Calif.

I first become fully aware of my new surroundings when I awake to the sound of waves’ breaking along the Pacific Shore and the barking of seals. No longer can the Dormition Abbey’s bells, chiming from Mt. Zion, mark the hour for me.

In some ways, it would be difficult to find a region less like Israel than Orange County. It’s true that the weather is similar to Jerusalem’s, minus the Holy City’s occasional snowstorms and sandstorms. Some international corporations offer identical wares in Israeli shopping centers and California malls: Zara, Tommy Hilfiger, Gap, Nine West and the like. And most restaurants in one place or the other feature such global favorites as hamburgers and fries, spicy pasta and elegant salads.

But the differences between the two locales are far more striking than their similarities. Jerusalem’s gold-hued stone buildings – most of them centuries old – bear little resemblance to the modernity in most of America’s suburban centers. One of the oldest and most picturesque places in Southern California – the chapel at the San Juan Capistrano Mission – dates to only 1776.

Meanwhile, the walls of Jerusalem’s Old City – built by Ottoman Sultan Suleiman “the Magnificent” in the 1500s – surround the Temple Mount, the Roman Cardo, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, the Mosque of Omar and dozens of other authentically ancient sites revered by Jews, Christians and Muslims alike.

Outside those city walls, a sleek modern light rail is juxtaposed against a jumble of venerable boutiques and cafes and trailing flowers along the Jaffa Road (first paved in the 19th century), leading to Jaffa/Yafo, a Mediterranean port that has served seafarers for more than 7,000 years. Jaffa is mentioned in the Hebrew Scriptures, the New Testament and in the historical writings of Josephus.

Still, buildings are only buildings, and of course it is people that bring cities to life. Health-conscious, hard-bodied California joggers, leashed to what some call “designer dogs,” are rarely sighted in Jerusalem, although scantily attired men and women do appear in the hot summer months.

These provide a rather jarring contrast to the modestly dressed Orthodox Jewish men and women in their dark colors and sober, weighty garb. Nor are Muslim women and girls, whether in brightly colored designer scarves or black hijabs, an unusual sight either, especially on the Eastern side of the city.

If there’s time for conversation with these various Jerusalemites, it doesn’t take long to learn of their experiences with war, terrorism, political disappointment or Holocaust history. Nearly everyone in the city has a story to tell – and there are countless broken hearts, half-healed wounds and deep scars. Yet, more often than not, a spirit of joy and celebration shines in their eyes.

In fact, it is here – in the stories of the people – that the contrast between my two familiar locales is most readily apparent.

In California, one of my usual stops is KBRT’s studio, where “The Bottom Line” talk radio host Roger Marsh often invites me in for an interview to discuss Israel and whatever the latest news about the Middle East may be.

It is during these radio interviews that I am most conscious of the fact that I live, for all practical purposes, in two different worlds. And that difference has to do with geography, but far more significantly with the rather messy details of human experience. Few Californians have had to face the threat of rocket fire, the danger of looming terrorism, the possibility of fleeing their homes or – worst of all – the loss of life, limb and loved ones.

These days, with the JCPOA – aka the “Iran Deal” – in the news, American Jews and Christians are expressing great concern for the future of Israel and the Jewish people who live there. And well they should.

“What is the American administration thinking?” Roger asked me in the course of our recent interview. I tried to answer, even though I can hardly imagine what kind of naiveté – or worse – has led to the unprecedented concessions that the U.S. (and other) negotiators have offered to Iran, seemingly on bended knee.

And at what human cost – apart from the billion-and-a-half dollars of unfrozen funds – will this agreement be signed, sealed and delivered?

To a large majority of Israelis, the danger of a nuclearized Iran – and ultimately a nuclear race involving several Middle East countries – is a very real threat. An enemy such as Iran – which habitually calls for “Death to Israel” and “Death to America” – is the last nation on earth that should have the capability of developing nuclear weapons. That is an insane proposition.

Many Californians like Roger and his listeners are aware of and concerned about the state of affairs in the Middle East. Admittedly, apart from the occasional earthquake, their experience with life-and-death challenges has been limited. Yet they want to get to the bottom of what’s really going on.

For example, we of a certain age who attended California elementary schools remember getting on our knees under our little wooden desks and covering our heads with our arms when “bomb drills” took place. In retrospect, it seems like a laughable exercise in futility. But of course the bombs never fell, so we didn’t realized until years later that we would have more likely been instantly incinerated than bumped on the head by a fallen ceiling tile.

In Israel, air raid sirens are quite another matter. I have an app on my iPhone called a Red Alert that makes a nerve-wracking sound if there’s a rocket attack anywhere in Israel. It startles me about once a month, when a missile is fired from Gaza or the Golan. Thankfully, no such application is currently necessary in California or anywhere else in the United States. May it ever be so.

But curiously, as I took a break from writing this very article, my Israeli Red Alert went off – most inappropriately – in a California café! Sirens had sounded in another seaside city, half a world away. An hour or so later, the Times of Israel reported,

Sirens were activated in the Hof Asheklon regional council north of the [Gaza] Strip before sunrise, sending frightened residents running to shelters. There were no reports of casualties or damage. The Israeli military said it was scanning for an impact site, but added that the sirens were likely the result of a failed launch attempt.

In nine years, only three times have air raid sirens threatened my calm life in Jerusalem, and those were all during Israeli military operations in Gaza. In every case, the rockets fell far short of Jerusalem’s city limits. I was away in July 2014 when rockets launched at Jerusalem struck a little closer to home.

Also in 2014, just after I returned there and Israel ended its battle with Hamas, another drama was acted out in the Christian heartland of Iraq. This was just over an hour’s flight away from Jerusalem. Assyrian International News Service reported on Aug. 7,

The push of the Islamic State (IS) from Mosul north into the Nineveh Plain, the last stronghold of Assyrians in Iraq, has created fear and panic in the population, causing a massive exodus from Assyrian villages. The influx of refugees into Ankawa and Noohadra (Dohuk) has overwhelmed the towns. There is a shortage of everything — shelter, food, water. Displaced Assyrians are sleeping on sidewalks and in open fields.

In Israel, Christians and Jews alike were horrified by this unprovoked assault; by seeing houses roughly painted with the Arabic letter “N,” marking them for invasion and confiscation; and by the Iraqi army’s utter lack of protection. The soldiers were described as simply having “melted away.”

In late October 2014, I was able to fly from Israel to Iraq to visit those same Christian refugees in Erbil, Kurdistan.

I found myself in the midst of broken, displaced women, men and children, who all told me essentially the same story: how they have lost everything – their homes, businesses, all personal possessions, passports, deeds and documents of ownership, vehicles, cash and food. ISIS has robbed them of their past, as well as their hopes for the future. They said, in so many words, that prayer is all that remains for them, but so shattered are their lives that even faith and hope seem ephemeral.

Can we American Christians even begin to imagine such a cruel twist of fate? With notable exceptions, America has been shielded from such atrocities imposed by bloodthirsty religious fanatics.

Perhaps natural disasters come closest to inflicting the kind of total personal losses that Middle East populations are enduring today. Americans have recently recalled the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, the deadly storm that nearly drowned the city of New Orleans 10 years ago. More recently, brush and forest fires have ravished vast swathes of the West Coast, leaving a trail of ashes where family homes once stood. Floods and tornados took a terrible toll, too, not so many months ago.

Victims will struggle to rebuild, battling governmental authorities, insurance companies and the emotional hardships of starting over. And in most cases, they will find a way.

For the rest of us, all things considered, life is good. I’m grateful to hear the rush of the ocean tides’ coming and going and the cry of gulls: hours of gentleness in what can be a hard, unyielding world.

But I do miss Mt. Zion’s echoing bells, and am happy that I’ll soon be back in Jerusalem to hear them peal once again. Those chimes, the sound of the muezzin’s call to the city’s mosques, and the warning of the Red Alert all serve to remind me of the time and place in which my friends and I live.

Meanwhile, weeks like these in Southern California reaffirm the virtue of gratitude. May the habit of thankful prayer be our first priority. And may it never have to become our last resort.