Palestine

The number Of Iraqis slaughtered since the U.S. invaded Iraq is 1,320,110. [1]

The number of U.S. military personnel whose mothers will never see them again live has been officially acknowledged at 4,284. [2]

So far, the War in Iraq has bled $667,095,136,653.00 from USA tax payers wallets.

The genesis of Mother's Day in the U.S.A. began when Anna Jarvis, an Appalachian homemaker, organized a day to raise awareness of poor health conditions in her community and fifteen years later, Julia Ward Howe, a Boston poet, pacifist, suffragist, and author of the lyrics to the "Battle Hymn of the Republic," organized a day encouraging mothers to rally for peace.

As mothers bear the loss of human life more acutely than anyone else, in 1870, Julia Ward Howe wrote the first Mother's Day Proclamation, from which I excerpt:

Arise then...women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts!
Whether your baptism be of water or of tears!
From the voice of a devastated Earth a voice goes up with
Our own. It says: "Disarm! Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice."
Blood does not wipe our dishonor; nor violence indicate possession. At the summons of war let women now leave all that may be left of home for a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.

In his regards to Israel on it 61st year of existence, President Obama reiterated, "The United States was the first country to recognize Israel in 1948, minutes after its declaration of independence [and] looks forward to working with Israel to advance our common interests, including the realization of a comprehensive peace in the Middle East."

The 1948 Declaration of the Establishment of Israel affirms that, "The State of Israel will be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel: it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion it will guarantee freedom of religion [and] conscience and will be faithful to the Charter of the United Nations."

"Words must mean something. Human destiny will be what we make of it."-President Obama, April 5, 2009.

On April 26, 2009, the Israeli police raided the homes of several New Profile activists in different parts of Israel and confiscated their computers. Five were hauled in for interrogation then released on bail under the undemocratic condition to not contact other members of the nonviolent movement for thirty days.

"The Crusade for a Christian Military: Jesus Killed Mohammed" by Jeff Sharlet in HARPER'S May 2009 edition is a chilling clarion call regarding the entrenchment of Christian fundamentalism in the USA military beginning during the Cold War that accelerated during the Vietnam era which has wrecked havoc on the very soul of our nation.

Fundamentalist [referred to as evangelical by Sharlet] Chaplains began to join the military in droves as they aligned themselves with the Industrial Military Complex in opposition with Catholics and mainline moderate Protestant denominations such as Methodists, Presbyterians, and Episcopalians who were of one voice speaking out against American terrorism in Vietnam and for following in the ways of the nonviolent Jesus.

“Starting in 1987, Protestant denominations were lumped together simply as “Protestant”; moreover, the Pentagon began accrediting hundreds of evangelical and Pentecostal “endorsing agencies,” allowing graduates of fundamentalist Bible colleges—which often train clergy to view those from other faiths as enemies of Christ—to fill up nearly the entire allotment for Protestant chaplains. Today, more than two thirds of the military’s 2,900 active-duty chaplains are affiliated with evangelical or Pentecostal denominations." [1]

Pope Benedict announced that he would visit the Holy Land this May to pray "for the precious gift of unity and peace for the Middle East and for all of humanity," but he would not be going to Gaza.

Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Vatican custodian of the holy sites stated, "This visit is aimed first and foremost at encouraging them to remain in this country."

Prayer without action is hypocrisy and faith without works is dead.

In November 2006, Father Manuel Mussalem, Pastor of Gaza's only Catholic Church of 200 faithful- who look to the Pope to speak for Jesus to them- penned on their behalf:

"Gaza cannot sleep! The people are suffering unbelievably. They are hungry, thirsty, have no electricity or clean water. They are suffering constant bombardments and sonic booms from low flying aircraft. They need food: bread and water. Children and babies are hungry...people have no money to buy food. The price of food has doubled and tripled due to the situation. We cannot drink water from the ground here as it is salty and not hygienic. People must buy water to drink. They have no income, no opportunities to get food and water from outside and no opportunities to secure money inside of Gaza. They have no hope.

By Deal W. Hudson
16 April 2009
InsideCatholic.com

Pope Benedict, his entourage and the international media are preparing to visit the Holy Land May 8-15. Pope Benedict XVI will undoubtedly encourage further peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians.

But the prospect of a two-state solution to the ongoing conflict has become more remote, as the situation on the ground is constantly changing. Here are the facts as they stand now, and which will confront the Holy Father when he arrives in Amman, Jordan on May 8:

1. The world's oldest Christian community -- the Christians of historic Palestine -- will be gone within two generations if the Church does not act to protect them.

2. Estimates show that more than 10 percent of the Palestinian Christian community on the West Bank has immigrated in the last five years alone. There is a corresponding number of Palestinian Christians leaving from towns like Nazareth and East Jerusalem located within Israel.

3. Tension with Muslims is not the primary reason for the exodus -- only 11 percent of Palestinian Christians cite it as a reason for immigration. In fact, these communities have historically coexisted peacefully, along with indigenous Jewish communities, for centuries before the birth of the modern Israeli conflict.

On April 8, 2009, Jeff Halper wrote from Jerusalem

Everyone loves peace, but not everyone loves peace-makers. The work of people like Stephen Sizer is crucial to peace-making. “Peace” is not merely a goody-goody term that we use on Christmas or Passover. It has to do with hard realities like conflict, injustice and suffering, all of which require not only good will, but an analysis which identifies the causes of the conflict and offers a way out. Hardest of all, peace-making requires self-reflection, self-criticism and the ability to see the viewpoint of the Other, the “enemy,” especially when “your side” is involved. And one more thing is essential to peace-making: an ability to reach out, even to your detractors, so that a common ground of action can be established.

I did a cartoon recently for Everyday Citizen on a day with my cat Jasper. You could look at it here .

One of the things I look forward to at the beginning of each month is to receive in the mail the latest issues of the Catholic Worker and Z Magazine. When I read both periodicals, I get information on activists and read about information in the grassroots that I don't find in any other periodicals. Though I don't always agree with every opinion that I read, I've learned a lot about different perspectives on the effects of globalization on the poor and marginalized in this world. Especially nowadays, as our country and the world struggles through hard economic times, it is easy to turn inwards to our national problems and forget the problems in the rest of the world. In my cartoon, I based some of the dialogue of the Facebook friends on articles that I've read in the latest issues of the Catholic Worker and Z Magazine.

"In a nutshell, there is a deep schizophrenia in the Holy Land; what we see, hear and talk. Zionism is the original sin; Zionism is an untouchable icon. You can curse Mohammad, you can curse Mary, but not Zionism."

Press Release From:

"Assembly of the Catholic Bishops in the Holy Land"

We, the members of the "Assembly of the Catholic Bishops in the Holy Land" deplore and condemn with utter dismay the repulsive attacks on our Lord Jesus Christ and on His Mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary, carried out on Channel 10 of the Israeli television.

In these days, during a night show on Channel 10, a series of horrible offenses were launched against our faith and consequently against us, Christians. The show directed its attacks to the holiest figures of our Christian belief in an attempt, as the director of the show himself specifically declared, to destroy Christianism. In so doing, Channel 10 was used to desecrate the holiest figures of Christianism offending hundreds of thousands of Christian Israeli citizens and of many millions of Christians all over the world as well.

Dwight Eisenhower understood that "people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our government. Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days, governments had better get out of their way and let them have it!"

One of those people on the forefront is the Anglican Reverend Naim Ateek, who has been seeking peace and reconciliation in the Holy Land by seeking justice; an end to the illegal occupation of Palestine and equal human rights for all people.

The Palestinian Ateek, became a refugee in 1948. He founded the Jerusalem based and internationally supported SABEEL organization in response to his experiences in 1948, the 1967 War and the first intifada [translates to: rise up and cast off] that erupted on December 9, 1987.

The theology of Sabeel is a theology that arose from the oppression of Palestinians under the state of Israel and also a theology of liberation from the watered down theology that keeps many Christians too comfortable.

Sabeel's liberation theology is rooted in righting the injustices inflicted upon the indigenous people of the Holy Land.

Sabeel offers an ecumenical and interfaith theology that seeks to unite the World Wide Body of Christ to the suffering of their sisters, brothers and cousins in the family of Father Abraham in Israel Palestine.