There are many sources for news and views about
what’s going on in the Middle East and what’s ahead.
Some followers of Pat Robertson’s 700 Club are
looking at weather patterns. The Christian Broadcasting Network reported
that May’s damaging tornados were a repercussion of U.S. pressure on
Israel that put the “covenant lands of Israel at risk.” According to
CBN, a researcher has proven that “when Israeli settlements are touched,
there are also occurrences of hurricanes, tornados, and major problems
in the American economy.”
This forecast may seem foolish to most Americans
and irrelevant to the serious business of crafting foreign policy.
However, the Christian-evangelical community along with its Christian
Zionist wing is a significant constituency for the Bush Administration
and Republican-majority Congress. Joining with some hard-line Jewish
groups, Christian Zionists have launched “The Committee for a One-State
Solution” with an eight-state billboard campaign to stop the Road Map
and its goal of a two- state resolution of the conflict. The locations
for the billboards were selected (according to the chair of Americans
for a Safe Israel) in states where the Republican presidential win was
slim, in order to make President Bush aware “that a disaffected
Christian Community can adversely affect” the coming presidential
campaign.
It is crucial for all advocates of a political and
diplomatic solution -- based on applying the rational elements of
international law and negotiation -- to counter the message of the
Christian Right. For those of us, including Churches for Middle East
Peace, whose political activism is also grounded in a faith-based
commitment to justice and peacemaking as Christians, there is an
additional responsibility to say publicly that there is an alternate
Christian perspective to that of Christian Zionists.
“THE BIBLE IS MY ROAD MAP”
This is the title of an internet petition
circulated by Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell and Tim LaHaye opposing the
Road Map and a political solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Beginning with “Save the Settlements,” the text asserts that the “peace
plan rewards terrorists,” talks about “tiny Israel giving its Bible land
to terrorist regimes,” and “dividing Jerusalem and giving a portion of
the city and our holy sites to an Islamic terrorist organization that
has killed Americans.”
Unashamedly playing on internal Administration
disputes, the petition asserts: “The State Department has been giving
Israel’s land to the PLO for more than a decade.” Another example comes
from television preacher Pat Robertson. In May, he asked his supporters
to mount a nationwide protest against the State Department and demand
the dismissal of William Burns, the Assistant Secretary of State for the
Near East. Some State Department officials believe there is a campaign
by conservatives to accuse the diplomatic corps of being disloyal to
Bush.
SELLING THE ROAD MAP TO
CONGRESS
Also seeking to discredit the State Department was
House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. In his April 2 remarks at the
gathering of Ralph Reed’s Stand for Israel, he said, “The moral
ambiguities of our diplomatic elites notwithstanding, Israel is not the
problem; Israel is the solution.”
The diplomatic problems of implementing the Road
Map will be compounded for the President by domestic politics. The
Christian conservatives, a core constituency for President Bush, are
passionately pro-Israel and deeply distrustful of the European Union and
the U.N. who are part of the “Quartet” sponsors of the Road Map. On
Capitol Hill, the religious right has joined forces with the
neoconservative wing of the Republican party and pro-Israel Democrats to
form a broad coalition of lawmakers who don’t want Israel pressured to
make concessions.
As Secretary of State Powell headed to the Middle
East in May, Representative Mike Pence (R-IN), who sits on the House
International Relations’s Middle East subcommittee, said “America is not
a neutral party in the negotiations in the Middle East. We are not, nor
do we aspire to be, an honest broker. America stands with Israel.”
According to CQ Weekly, a reputable Capitol
Hill publication, one of AIPAC’s (American-Israel Public Affairs
Committee) legislative priorities is Congress’ “codification” of the
major changes that Israel seeks in the Road Map. Such legislation could
be in the form of a non-binding resolution or attached to an
appropriations bill that would restrict the Administration’s ability to
fund peace-related initiatives.
WHAT’S IN A NAME?
News reports often use the political term
“Christian Right,” “Christian fundamentalists” or refer generally to
“conservative Christians” or “Evangelicals.” Yet, not all who fall
within those groupings hold to biblically-mandated support for Israel.
The term “Christian Zionist” is probably most
accurate, even though “Zionism” itself is a concept that emerged in the
late 19th century among Jewish intellectuals out of the
ferment of nationalist, socialist and utopian ideas that swept through
Europe at the time. The Zionist movement sought and achieved the
founding and development of a Jewish homeland (now Israel) in Palestine,
then a part of the Ottoman Empire. Now, many Zionists, both Israeli and
American-Jewish, support ending Israel’s occupation and establishing a
Palestinian state. Not so with Christian Zionists. Central to Christian
Zionism is the belief in the abiding relevance of the promise God made
to Abraham in Genesis 12:3, “I will bless those who bless you, and
whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be
blessed through you.”
Some of the organizations associated with Christian
Zionism are: the Christian Coalition of America, the International
Fellowship of Christians and Jews, National Unity Coalition for Israel,
Christian Broadcasting Network, Christians for Israel-U.S., Gary Bauer’s
American Values and The International Christian Embassy in Jerusalem.
EVANGELICALS WHO DO
SUPPORT PEACE
Christian Zionists may identify themselves as
evangelical Christians, but not all evangelical Christians agree with
their uncritical support of Israel. In July of 2002, nearly 60
prominent evangelical theologians and heads of organizations wrote to
the President, voicing an even-handed policy towards Israelis and
Palestinians that affirms two states, “free, economically viable and
secure.” They asked that the President vigorously “oppose injustice,
including the continued unlawful and degrading Israeli settlement
movement,” which they characterized as “the theft of Palestinian land.”
Regarding theology, they wrote, “Significant
numbers of American evangelicals reject the way some have distorted
biblical passages as their rationale for uncritical support for every
policy and action of the Israeli government instead of judging all
actions – of both Israelis and Palestinians – on the basis of biblical
standards of justice. The great Hebrew prophets, Isaiah and Jeremiah,
declared in the Old Testament that “God calls all nations and all people
to do justice one to another, and to protect the oppressed, the alien,
the fatherless and the widow.”
IGNORING PALESTINIAN
CHRISTIANS
U.S. Christians travel to the Holy Land as pilgrims
and are a major segment of the tourism industry. They visit the holy
sites but most have virtually no contact with Arab Christians
themselves. Arab Christians hold strongly negative views of Christian
Zionism, which is considered by some to be an instrument of Western
colonialism and American imperialism. The zealous support given Israel’s
claim of sovereignty over all of Jerusalem and the building of
settlements in “Judea and Samaria” by these Western Christians angers
both Christian and Muslim Palestinians. Some evangelical churches have
supportive relationships with settlements.
Among Palestinians, there are the traditional
churches – Greek Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox and Roman Catholic – and
the so-called “reform” churches established in the 19th
century – Lutherans and Episcopalians or Anglicans. They work
ecumenically through the Middle East Council of Churches. These
Christians consider themselves, and are considered by the Muslims, to be
an integral part of the Palestinian community, even though they are a
minority of less than 2%.
From his Jerusalem office, Bishop Munib Younan, of
the Evangelical Lutheran Church, has written that “Christian Zionism is
the enemy of peace in the Middle East.” The Rev. Naim Ateek, director
of Jerusalem’s Sabeel Ecumenical Liberation Theological Center, has
called pre-millenialism a “heresy” and Christian Zionism a “menace.”
THEOLOGY, POPULAR FICTION
AND THE CHURCH IN SOCIETY
When the Washington Post commits a full page
of its Sunday opinion section to a religious topic, it clearly has
political significance. On February 2, the headline was “It’s the
Dawning of the Age of Apocalypse.” American Studies professor Melani
McAlister wrote about the very popular “Left Behind” fictional series –
the last four have topped the best-seller lists. She writes of the
“stark political spirituality at the heart of the stories, which can
fairly be described as Christian Jihadist. It is the obligation of the
‘Left Behind’ Christians both to evangelize as many potential converts
as possible and to join in battle on behalf of Israel against the armies
of the Antichrist.”
The term “Left Behind,” along with “the rapture”,
“pre-millennialism”, “end-times” and “Armageddon” are parts of the
terminology associated with this strain of eschatology – which is the
study of the “last things,” the culmination of history and the second
coming of Jesus Christ.
It is the political implications of these beliefs
that troubles Churches for Middle East Peace. McAlister writes that
“Left Behind” authors Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins undercut the very
notion of Middle East peace, from Israel to Iraq. With the Antichrist
posing as a peacemaker and campaigning for world disarmament, such
things as arms control or peace processes are fig leaves for those
planning world domination. That Israel is the epicenter of Armageddon,
the final battle, is made clear to the “Left Behind” readers.
With a theology that calls us to be peacemakers,
the approach of Churches for Middle East Peace is grounded in the
National Council of Churches policy statement that was approved in
1980. This “calls upon U.S.A. Christians to recognize the moral
dimensions of political action, to give witness to God’s justice, love
and mercy, to build peace upon the foundation of justice.”
The deep religious significance and spiritual value
of the Middle East is affirmed for Jews and Muslims as well as for
Christians. “Affirming the need for mutual respect and understanding, it
[the NCC statement] acknowledges the reality of strife; it seeks to
identify the sources of mistrust and prejudice and to lay the basis for
reconciliation.”
Catholic biblical scholar, Ronald Witherup, SS, in
an article titled “Whose Land Is It?” wrote that: “We should acknowledge
the perennial value of the Bible’s teachings without asserting that the
Bible applies directly to every moral situation in our own world. This
approach is both thoroughly Catholic and consistent with many other
interpretive traditions, Protestant and Jewish…..We must begin with
reality as it now exists. The situation ‘on the ground’ is what we must
now confront. There is no going back to an idyllic, pre-modern
vision.”
And it was the situation on the ground that
compelled the statement of a delegation of U.S. Church leaders who
visited Jerusalem, Jenin, Bethlehem and Beit Jala in May of 2002. “The
word of the Spirit in our day is a call to all people of faith to be
witnesses to the way of peace. That witness begins with unceasing
prayer. It calls us to be reconcilers, to stand for truth, forgiveness,
and justice in every place. Only thus may we sing to the Lord a new
song.”
URGENT ACTION:
“We believe that with
hard work and good faith and courage, it is possible to bring peace to
the Middle East…The Holy Land must be shared between the state of
Palestine and the state of Israel, living at peace with each other and
with every nation of the Middle East.” President George W. Bush,
June 4, 2003
If the President
stands by his words, if the Congress lends its support, and if
Israeli-Palestinian leaders can end the cycle of violence, the hopes and
prayers for Middle East peace could be realized. The Road Map for a
two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian peace may be the focus for
some time – with debates over the precise meaning of requirements and
timing; with Congressional initiatives to block or support its
implementation; with efforts to diminish or enhance the role of the
Quartet; with despair or hope that the two-state vision might prevail.
One key question is: Will the President press Prime Minister Sharon on
the Road Map’s phase-one requirement that the government of Israel
freeze all settlement activity and dismantle those erected since March
2001?
The advocacy guidance for Churches for Middle East
Peace is customarily drawn from the policy statements of its members --
faith-based tenets of witnessing for peace and the call to be
reconcilers – without broadcasting our personal or institutional
identity as Christian. Now, relative to Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking,
the identity of “Christian” must be reclaimed by the vast numbers of
Christians who do not believe in the tenets of Christian-Zionism. The
linkage between Christianity and peace must be strengthened in the mind
of policymakers.
