This hurts people of good will everywhere. And as a Knight of the Sepulchre, my heart is especially heavy for the Palestinian Christians trapped in the Gaza.
Pope calls for cease-fire as young Israeli–American found dead in Gaza tunnel along with 5 other hostages
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Jerusalem — In what was a devastating Sunday morning for hostage families, Israel said Sept. 1 that it had recovered the bodies of six hostages in Gaza, including Israeli–American Hersh Goldberg–Polin, whose parents became outspoken global advocates for all hostages to be released.
The military confirmed all six had been killed shortly before the arrival of Israeli forces, The Associated Press reported. The army identified the other dead hostages as Ori Danino, 25; Eden Yerushalmi, 24; Almog Sarusi, 27; and Alexander Lobanov, 33; who, like Hersh, were taken on Oct. 7, 2023, from the music festival. The sixth, Carmel Gat, 40, was abducted from the nearby farming community of Be'eri. All six bodies were discovered in a Gaza tunnel with gunshot wounds.
Pope Francis, in his Sept. 1 Angelus prayer, said "I once again turn my thoughts with concern to the conflict in Palestine and Israel, which risks spreading to other Palestinian cities. I appeal for the negotiations to continue and for an immediate ceasefire, the release of hostages, and relief to the people of Gaza, where many diseases are also spreading, such as poliomyelitis."
The pontiff urged: "May there be peace in the Holy Land, may there be peace in Jerusalem!"
[…]
Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza has killed over 40,000 Palestinians, according to local health officials. It has displaced the vast majority of Gaza’s 2.3 million people.
Fighting in Gaza paused for a brief time while polio vaccinations were carried out after U.N. officials confirmed a 10-month-old baby had been partially paralyzed after contracting Gaza’s first case of polio for 25 years. Israel has agreed to a series of “humanitarian pauses” in Gaza to allow for the vaccination of children against polio.
Thanks for finding this, Wozzie.Wosbald wrote: ↑03 Sep 2024, 16:55 +JMJ+
Source: Florida Catholic Media / OSV News
Link: thefloridacatholic DOT org/news/world/pope-calls-for-cease-fire-as-young-israeli-american-found-dead-in-gaza-tunnel-along/article_32f21f6c-6891-11ef-bf93-7b80a01e11ec.html
Pope calls for cease-fire as young Israeli–American found dead in Gaza tunnel along with 5 other hostages
In Israel, the lonely fight for interfaith dialogue
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Against the tide of their societies, Jews, Christians, and Muslims are trying to offer a united religious voice based on the recognition of human rights — a battle they fight largely alone.
Europe\Rome — In the barren parking lot of the Kerem Shalom crossing point at the southern tip of the Gaza Strip, amid the constant movement of humanitarian aid trucks and Israeli military armored vehicles, prayers are sung: “Hear our hope and our prayers.” They are Jews, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists — rabbis, pastors, imams — and most have come from the United States on a solidarity trip.
In a symbolic gesture, they chose to hold this interfaith prayer at the Gaza border, calling for a ceasefire, an end to violence, an arms embargo, and to assert that alternative religious voices do exist. In the harsh midday light, the group spreads out a keffiyeh on the ground and places various objects on it: a passport, a water bottle, an olive branch, an icon of the Virgin Mary, and a rosary. “Each item represents our prayers for this land: freedom of movement, peace, access to water and food, and a harmonious relationship between religions,” explained American Rabbi Abby Stein before a Syriac Orthodox Christian begins the Lord’s Prayer in Aramaic.
“We forget the other when we do not see them”
[…]
If interfaith initiatives were not popular in Israel before, they are even less so since October 7. “Since the war, people don’t want to talk to each other,” sighed Omar Haramy, director of Sabeel, a Palestinian Christian liberation theology center based in Jerusalem, who is coordinating the American interfaith delegation’s trip. “This lack of dialogue reinforces the perception of the other as the enemy; it dehumanizes. We forget the other when we do not see them.”
Since taking over Sabeel in 2006, Haramy has become one of the prominent Palestinian Christian faces of interfaith dialogue. Convinced that a partnership with Jewish neighbors is essential to finding a “common solution” to this conflict, which has lasted for 75 years, Omar works hand in hand with Rabbis for Human Rights (RHR), an Israeli NGO active in the Palestinian Territories.
“Interfaith dialogue has never been more meaningful than it is today,” asserted Avi Dabush, executive director of RHR. A survivor of the October 7 attacks and now displaced, he gave a brief talk to the American delegation from his kibbutz, Nirim, before they headed to Kerem Shalom. “As a nation, perpetuating the narrative of eternal victimhood will not bring us security. We need an alternative voice in Israeli Judaism,” said this former religious Zionist. Going against the grain of an increasingly war-driven Israeli society, RHR has chosen to deepen its commitment to dialogue. Concerned with protecting the “sanctity of human life,” the organization has stepped up its solidarity efforts and protective presence among the Palestinian communities in Area C of the West Bank, the most vulnerable to settler violence.
A complicated task
The number of rabbis who have joined the NGO has grown from 150 to 160 this year. “It’s still challenging to find Israelis willing to enter the field. There are things stuck in their hearts, and the intimidation by the Israeli army doesn’t help,” laments Anton Goodman, director of partnerships for RHR, who is quite pessimistic about the future: “After traveling through the West Bank and its settlements, I’ve lost confidence and hope. I no longer believe in a peaceful future.” Yet, he continues to fight for the sake of his children.
On the Palestinian side, Haramy also feels the loneliness of those advocating dialogue. “People are afraid. Some join us in prayer, others in action, but it’s complicated. At Sabeel, we have decided to follow Jesus. We bear a cross.”
Another well-known figure in the small world of interfaith dialogue in Israel, Sheikh Hassan Abu Eliyon, imam and spiritual leader of the Bedouin town of Rahat, draws a parallel with the Bible: “We are a bit like Noah — no one understood why he kept building an ark. People mocked him, but Noah believed in God’s message. We must be proud descendants of Noah.”
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Faces of Dialogue
- Rabbis for Human Rights: Founded in 1988, this Israeli organization described itself as “the rabbinic voice of conscience in Israel, giving voice to the Jewish tradition of human rights.” Known for its protection of Palestinian olive pickers, the organization received the Niwano Peace Prize in 2006.
- Sabeel: Meaning “Path” in Arabic, Sabeel is a Christian liberation theology organization. Founded in 1994 by Palestinian Anglican Reverend Naim Ateek, it promotes the presence and testimony of Palestinian Christians.
I don't trust our news media to tell us any important facts. All the same, I am encouraged by the silence.
The exploding pagers and walkie-talkies targeting members of Hezbollah in Lebanon were certainly an espionage and technological coup. Few people on the spot or reading about them from far away could fail to be amazed. But the explosions on Tuesday and Wednesday were also very likely war crimes — terrorist attacks by a state that has consistently condemned terrorist attacks on its own citizens.
Yes, the devices most probably were being used by Hezbollah operatives for military purposes. This might make them a legitimate target in the continuous cross-border battles between Israel and Hezbollah. But the attacks, which killed at least 37 people and wounded thousands of others, came when the operatives were not operating; they had not been mobilized and they were not militarily engaged. Rather, they were at home with their families, sitting in cafes, shopping in food markets — among civilians who were randomly killed and injured.
Israel has neither confirmed nor denied responsibility for the attacks but is widely believed to be behind them. If those allegations are true, it is important for friends of Israel to say: This was not right.
The theory of just war depends heavily on the distinction between combatants and civilians. In contemporary warfare, these two groups are often mixed together in the same spaces — often, indeed, deliberately mixed together, because the killing of civilians invites moral condemnation. The war that Hamas designed in Gaza is a grim illustration of the strategy of putting civilians at risk for political gain. Still, a military responding to this strategy has to do everything it can to avoid or minimize civilian casualties. Israel claims to be doing that in Gaza, although serious criticism of its conduct there has appeared in media around the world, not to mention a case brought against Israeli and Hamas officials alike at the International Criminal Court alleging war crimes and crimes against humanity.
No similar claim of minimizing risk to civilians can be made for the decision to explode the devices. They were not distributed by Hezbollah in order to put its people at risk. This was not a plot to force Israel to kill or injure civilians. The plot was Israel's, and the plotters had to know that at least some of the people hurt would be innocent men, women and children.
I don't think "going to get a shawarma" counts as hiding among civvies.
